


A little different

by Shokamaru



Category: Sekai-ichi Hatsukoi
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-21
Updated: 2018-02-18
Packaged: 2019-03-14 05:49:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 30,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13583586
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shokamaru/pseuds/Shokamaru
Summary: Takano saved Ritsu but was injured in the process and Yokozawa blames all of Takano's pain and misery on Ritsu. With everything piling up relentlessly, Ritsu eventually falls into depression. Takano notices and is trying to bring him back onto his own two feet, with the help of the Emerald department, but who knows how long that would take.





	1. Chapter 1: End of the cycle

"ONODERA! What are you doing! Hurry and get your ass and the manuscripts to the printers!"

It was hell week at Marukawa publishing for the Emerald editing team. Being the coordinator for the magazine, I was responsible for collecting all the manuscripts from my co-workers and passing it over to the printers. Currently, we were all doing the final checks for our respective authors and we were only left with Yoshikawa Chiharu-sensei's work before we were done.

After doing a final check on Mutou-sensei's manuscript, I gingerly stalked over to Takano-san for him to do a final check. It was just then when I noticed that everyone was looking horrible. Kisa-san had long passed out and was slumped on his desk. Hatori-san had a huge amount of bags under his eyes and his usually neat clothes were crumpled. Mino-san had a few strands of hair standing but was smiling nonetheless. But the worst was Takano-san. His eyes were puffy from not sleeping enough and he had recently caught a flu, causing him to sniff non-stop throughout the day.

Just as Takano-san gave me the ok for Mutou-sensei's manuscript, Hatori-san ran in. "Gomen. Yoshikawa Chiharu's manuscripts just came in. Takano-san, please do a final check."

Takano-san quickly grabbed the manuscript and did a quick check. After giving the ok, he quickly passed me Hatori-san's manuscript. I practically snatched the manuscript and headed to my desk to collect the remaining manuscripts when I tripped over some stray paper on the floor.

"ONODERA! What are you doing! Hurry and get your ass and the manuscripts to the printers!"

"HAI HAI I'M GOING NOW!" I said with alittle too much annoyance in my voice as I swiftly scooped up all the manuscripts. After collecting all the manuscripts, I ran to the lift to see:

-Out of Service. Sorry for any inconvenience caused-

'Ughh... great I have to take the stairs' I silently cursed in my head as I turned around and stomped towards the stairs. As soon as I took a step down, a voice caught my attention.

"Onodera! Wait!"

'Ughh... What does Takano-san want now?!' "Wha-" My vision suddenly changed from the lift to the lights in the staircase.

Recovering from the initial shock, I tried to recall what exactly had happened, my train of thoughts led me to believe that I had slipped on the top stair when I turned around. Just then, I was jolted out of my thoughts when I heard a sharp inhale.

It turns out that came from Takano-san who was on top of me at the bottom of the stairs.

"T...Ta...ka...no...san?"


	2. Chapter 2: Problems surfacing

"T...Ta...ka...no...san?"

After a few seconds, the body above me slowly got up and hazel eyes looked straight into my emerald ones. Realising how close we were, my face flushed a brilliant red as I stared back into those beautiful hazel eyes, worry evident on my face.

As Takano-san slowly stood up, I could feel something slipping out from under my head. I then found out that Takano-san had used his hand as a cushion to prevent my head from hitting the hard concrete floor. After standing up and brushing off any dust stuck onto him, he scanned me over. Seeing no visible injuries, he smacked me over the head with a few pieces of paper.

"BAKA! Are you trying to crack your head open? Geez... How much of a klutz can you be?!"

Instantly snapping out of my shocked phase, I snapped back at Takano-san. "Excuse me but the only reason I fell is becau- "

I was unable to finish my sentence as Takano-san held the pieces of paper he had used to whack my head with, in front of my face. "You dropped your own author's manuscript. How do you expect the printers to print things that are not even there?! Baka..."

Why does he have to be so mean and annoying?! I stood up quickly and snatched the papers out of his hand. Before I could say anything else, I was pulled into a tight hug and Takano-san mumbled into my ear in his deep melodic voice.

"Thank you for worrying about me. It makes me really happy."

Turning a deep red, I pushed myself off him and stared at the ground, unable to face him while stuttering out of embarrassment. "Wha...what are you talking about?! Who would worry about you? An...anyways, th...than...ks for passing me the papers. Bu...but please do not use my author's work to assault people, and please stop teasing me while we are still at work!"

When I finally looked up, Takano-san's signature smirking face came into full view and before he could say anything, I spun around and continued to make my way over to the printers with my face turning as red as a tomato. 'Why does he tease me so much! Stupid Takano-san! Why am I still thinking about him?!'

After I safely reached the printers without any other incidents, I slowly walked back to the office to report back to Takano-san. I unconsciously moved my hand up to my head where Takano-san's hand was. I could still feel the warmth of his palm from that spot. A blush crept onto my face as I started to rub it in a circular motion. 'Why am I still thinking about him?'

Reaching back to the office, everyone had left except Takano-san who was waiting for me to return. I hastily made my way back to my desk and started packing up when Takano-san stood silently behind me. As I reported to him that the manuscripts were safely delivered to the printers without any other incidents, he patted my head and said "Good job, you did well." A small blush crept onto my face after hearing Takano-san's praise.

Shortly afterwards, we both made our way back to our apartment. Along the way, Takano-san was sniffing non-stop and massaging his right hand. I simply brushed it off as his hand aching from editing many manuscripts in one day, nothing significant. Little did I know that it wasn't as simple as I wished it to be.


	3. Chapter 3: Concern

"CRASH"

I jolted out of my peaceful slumber as a loud crash could be heard coming from my neighbor's apartment. I groggily rubbed the sleep off my eyes. Looking over to where my alarm clock was, I growled as I came face to face with '9.30'. Today was Sunday, which is technically my only free day and I had planned on catching up on my sleep, until Takano-san just had to rudely wake me up from my wonderful slumber.

Wearing whatever clothes I could find, I decided to check on my neighbor. Honestly speaking, I was worried that something had happened as Takano-san isn't the careless type of person to break anything. Not like I would ever admit that I was worried about him since yesterday.

"Ding-dong"

While waiting for Takano-san to open the door, I could hear shuffling coming from inside the house and his beautiful voice resonating out from his apartment: "Sorry, please give me a minute." After a minute or so, Takano-san's door opened to reveal Takano-san in his usual sleep wear, a black shirt with long black slacks. He had a few stray strains of hair standing on the back of his head. The strange thing was that he had used his left hand to hold the door open instead of his usual right hand and talking about that, I was behind his back.

"Onodera? What are you doing here? Did something happen? And what are you wearing?"

As he bombsred me with questions, the last question got me curious and I decided to look down. I realised that I had worn my seaweed colored shirt inside out with the label jutting out from the back. My grey slacks were way too short, exposing my ankles. I looked like a fashion flop without even considering my bed hair. Add everything together and I looked basically, horrible.

My face flushed from embarrassment as I continued to ask Takano-san.

"Wha...what about you Takano-san. I...i heard a loud crash and decided to come over to check on you..."

Dying from embarrassment, I was unable to face Takano-san. However, I could somehow picture his face even without looking upwards. Hazel eyes looking like they were about to pop out of their sockets and mouth slightly agape.

Suddenly, Takano-san stepped out of his apartment. The clicking of his door when it closed made me look up out of curiosity. Bad idea. The minute I looked up, Takano-san's and my forehead connected, our faces a mere millimeter apart. With this unexpected action, I quickly backed away, flustered. "Ta...TAKANO-SAN! What do you think you're doing?!"

"Checking if you have a fever. You seem really out of it, your fashion sense is way worse then ever. And for your information, that sound was me dropping one of my cups because my hand slipped. Another reason I'm checking is because you never ever worry about me. Although you it's something new, I feel loved." And there it was, Takano-san's signature smirk with a small blush highlighting his face.

"I...i was stupid to have cared about you! Seems like everything is okay since you still can tease me! Bye!"

With that said, I sped back to my apartment and slammed my door shut. In the comforts and safety of my own home, my legs buckled and and slid down the door, my face still flushed and in my hands. 'Baka Takano-san. Why does he always have to make my heart skip a beat.'

Outside in the corridor, Takano-san was still standing in the same spot. "Aww, he cares about me. So cute. Ow..." His smirk was replaced with a wince of pain as he gently cradled his slightly swollen hand. 'Seems like this injurying is worse than I thought, guess I should go see a doctor...'


	4. Chapter 4: Falling apart

"How many times must I tell you to stay away from Masamune?! Everytime you are near him, he gets hurt and this time is no different!"

"Excuse me but I have no idea what you're saying. I didn't hurt him at all!"

"Go take a good look at Masamune's hands and tell me that you didn't cause that because of your clumsiness on the stairs!"

After the incident at the corridor, I decided to wash up. A good shower later, I went out to change into acceptable looking clothes and made some tea. I poured hot water into an empty mug I found lying around and put a green tea tea bag into the cup. As I watched the colorless liquid slowly become green, I started spacing out.

"Masamune! Did you forget that we were supposed to eat lunch together? I have been waiting for you downstairs for at least 30 minutes!" Yokozawa's voice shook me out of my spaced out stupor. From where I was in the kitchen, I could hear everything they said.

"Oh no, I'm sorry. I forgot about it. I'll be ready in about 5 minutes. Why don't you come in and wait for me."

There was a good long silence before Yokozawa-san broke it.

"Ah sorry. I need to discuss Onodera's next project with him. I'll be next door, tell me when you are ready."

'My project? Didn't we finish that discussion already?' I thought to myself. Before I could react, my doorbell rang. I placed my mug down on the counter and opened my door to see none other than the wild bear Yokozawa-san.

"Let me in. We need to discuss about your project." He continued walking past my door without me inviting him to do so and closed the door.

"Ah Yokozawa-san. Would you like some tea? I can make a cup really quick." I said as I turned around towards the direction of my kitchen, trying to create some distance between us. Before I could take a step further, Yokozawa-san started scolding me.

"How many times must I tell you to stay away from Masamune?! Everytime you are near him, he gets hurt and this time is no different!"

"Excuse me but I have no idea what you're saying. I didn't hurt him at all!"

"Go take a good look at Masamune's hands and tell me that you didn't cause that because of your clumsiness on the stairs!"

"Wha- what are you talking about? How do you know that I fell?"

"I was there when the both of you fell. Baka! Now can you please keep your distance from Masamune, you are only hurting him, just like what you have been doing for 10 years!"

Saying that I was confused was an understatement, I had no idea what Yokozawa-san was talking about. Hurting Takano-san in the fall? What is he talking about? Takano-san wasn't hurt!

Click

My door opened and Takano-san's face came into my view.

"Are you done with your discussion? And Onodera, don't forget that we are having dinner together tonight."

"Ya we are done. Onodera! Remember what I said and fix your problem!"

With all that said, both Yokozawa-san and Takano-san turned around and started to leave. It was then i noticed Takano-san's hand. I was red and slightly swollen. Recalling Yokozawa-san's words, 'Everytime you are near him, he gets hurt and this time is no different!', realisation struct me hard as I connected all the pieces together. Takano-san's hand was injured because he protected me from the fall... This is all my fault.

When the door finally closed, my legs lost their strength and I sat there dumbfounded. 'you are only hurting him, just like what you have been doing for the past 10 years!' Thinking back to all the times that Yokozawa-san has told me to stay away from Takano-san, I finally realised the damage that I inflicted upon him.

10 years ago when I left for England, I left Takano-san behind without any explanation.

Damage 1

A while later, Takano-san found out that I had a fiancee and was in a depressed state. He would constantly sleep with random girls and would drown himself in alcohol. He was a mess. And the one who helped him get back up was Yokozawa-san.

Damage 2

And this time when he saved me but at the cost of his hand

Damage 3

Thinking back, all the damaged inflicted was huge and it affected Takano-san so much that he was complete different from 10 years ago and the reason was me.

Still sitting on the floor, I pulled my legs up to my chest, buried my head in my hands and softly sobbed to myself. 'It's all my fault...'


	5. Chapter 5: Slightly better

At around dinner time, Takano-san came over to my apartment and pressed my doorbell. Without checking I opened the door. Bad idea. I really should have checked, then I could possibly fake that I wasn't home and I wouldn't have to face him.

"Yo, time for dinner. You ready to go? By the way, you're deciding where we are eating today."

"Sorry Takano-san but I'm not up for dinner today. Just have dinner by yourself."

"What are you talking about? We already agreed that we would go out and eat together. Now let's go." Without waiting for my reply, he yanked me out and dragged me towards the lift.

"Let go Takano-san! I said I'm not going with you!"

Just as I was about to smack his hands away, I noticed that he had used his right hand to drag me out. His right hand was wrapped in bandages and was still slightly swollen but it looked much better. At this moment I had stopped resisting and Takano-san had stopped pulling me.

When he realised that I was looking at his hand, he pulled his hand as well as my hand up to his face. My eyes continued following it and I ended up looking straight into his eyes.

"Finally you're looking at me."

"Ta..takano…san. Wha…what happened to your hand?"

"Ah, this? It's nothing much just a sprain I got yesterday."

Thinking back to what Yokozawa-san had told me.

'Go take a good look at Masamune's hands and tell me that you didn't cause that because of your clumsiness on the stairs!'

"I'm sorry… I did this to you…" I mumbled as I ripped my hands out of his grip and ran back to my apartment before slamming the door shut.

"Onodera, please hear me out. I won't ask you to open the door because I know that you won't but just listen to me. It's not your fault, it was my own carelessness. You don't have to apologise for it."

"Please leave me alone Takano-san. I…I can't face you now..."

I pulled my legs up to my chest and hid my head in my hands, the smell of medication all around me.

The next morning, I had deliberately left my apartment earlier so I wouldn't bump into Takano-san on the way to work.

When I arrived at the office, it was as I had expected, no one was there. After 30 minutes or so, people started coming in and settling down in their seats and starting their respective work. An hour later, everyone had arrived and was doing their work, all except a particular demon editor. Just as I was wondering where he was, he sauntered in. As he passed my seat, I could smell the same scent of medication, exactly similar to the smell yesterday.

As if on cue, everyone's eyes followed Takano-san as he walked to his desk. When he placed his work bag on the table and opened it to take out his documents, a white bandage could be seen tightly worn around his right hand.

"Wuah Takano-san! What happened to your hand?" Kisa-san's bright voice broke through a silence that had formed when we all stopped working.

"Huh? Oh, I accidentally sprained it and when I went to the doctors yesterday to get it checked out, they said it was nothing serious but to be on the safe side, they bandaged it up." Takano-san simply stated as he massaged it gently.

I unconsciously stared at Takano-san's bandaged arm and only looked away when Takano-san told us all to get back to work. For the whole day, I was constantly looking over to Takano-san and was hardly focused on my own work. I noticed that he was editing at a much slower pace but at least he was still able to do his work and it wasn't as swollen as it was yesterday.

At around lunch time, just as I was about to go for lunch by myself, Takano-san suddenly called my name. "Onodera, you were very unfocused the whole day. I don't need any half-assed workers in my department, so please get your act together."

"Hai hai…" I said as I looked downwards, avoiding his gaze.

"Onodera" I looked up to him. "Let's go for lunch. To make up for our dinner last night."

Before I could disagree, he dragged me out of the office to a nearby restaurant where we silently had our meal. I did not dare to look up at him during the whole duration of the meal. The only sounds that could be heard were the sounds of cutlery hitting the plates as people ate their meal with a soft music playing in the background.

Turning my gaze slightly upwards, I could see that Takano-san was indeed having a hard time holding his cutlery.

"Ano… Takano-san, is your hand still painful?"

"Alittle but it's much better. Were you going to offer to feed me if I said that it was?" And it appeared, Takano-san's signature smirk.

"Wha- No way! Dream on!"

At that moment, my cell phone rang and I excused myself from the table. When I picked up the phone, my mother's voice shrieked through my phone speakers.

"RITSU!"


	6. Chapter 6: Falling slowly

"RITSU"

"Ah mom? Why are you calling me now?"

"Because you turned down An-Chan! What were you thinking Ritsu?! An-chan is such a nice girl, you will never ever find someone as perfect as her anymore! Do you have someone else you like? Is that why you turned down An-chan? I arranged this marriage for you for the good of Onodera publishing. Do you not understand your own position as the next heir to your father's business? Please be serious and think about your future for once..."

I silently listened to my mum go on and on until the part where she mentioned that I was doing everything half-assed. At that moment, I could not stand it anymore and just hung up on her. Letting out a breath that I don't remember holding, I composed myself by taking deep breaths and walked back into the restaurant.

I said a small apology as I walked back to the table and continued my meal. Surprisingly, Takano-san only asked me who it was and when I told him that it was my mother, he merely acknowledged and continued eating without pestering me like usual. We ate our food in silence and afterwards we started our slow walk back to the office. Along the way, Takano-san lit a cigarette and started smoking. He tilted his head upwards and faced the sky as a puffed a straight cloud of smoke. Without looking down, he continued by asking me if everything was alright. Taken back my the sudden question, I did not know what to reply so I just went with 'ya'. It was a short answer and I thought that Takano-san was satisfied with the answer. Sadly, I was mistaken.

"Good. Don't let your private life affect your work. Even though we just ended hell week, we can't slack off."

Feeling annoyed with Takano-san I merely laced my words with my annoyance. 'Hai hai.'

It was true that hell week was over but the statistics for the sale would be out soon and they had to start on their new magazine. Once again, Takano-san had given the role of magazine coordinator to me. On top of being the magazine coordinator, I had my own project to do for Mutou-sensei;s new book. To add on to my wonderful load, Takano-san had given me a new author to manage. Of course, Takano-san had asked if I had too much work on my plate, but I told him that it was fine. If I told him otherwise, he would probably falsely accuse me doing my work half-assed.

As we were about to enter the building, my phone ringed again. Checking the caller ID to find out that it was my mother, I was really tempted to hang up and I did so. Takano-san eyed me suspiciously but did not say anything else.

Back at the office, I found a stack of manuscripts on my desk. Before I could ask what it was, Kisa-san had probably read my mind as he answered me. "Oh those just came in the fax machine from your new author. Also, Yokozawa-san came by earlier asking when you could hand in your proposal for Mutou-sensei's project."

Acknowledging and thanking Kisa-san, I sat down and started on Mutou-sensei's project. As I slowly filled up the form for Yokozawa-san, my phone rang again. Seeing that it was from my mother again, I excused myself and picked up her call.

"RITSU! Why did you hang up just now?! What has gotten into you?"

"Sorry mum, I can't talk with you now. I'm at work."

"Oh. So now your work is more important than your family? You even had the nerve to hang up on me when we were still talking? You are not the Ritsu I know."

"What-"

"I don't want to hear excuses from you. You better get your act together. You are already 25 years old! Can you think about your future as the head of Onodera publishing? Do you just want to let all your father's hard work go to waste just because you can't figure your own life out? Stop doing everything so half-assed!"

"When did I ever do anything half-assed?! I've been doing my work seriously and I AM seriously thinking about the future!" Unable to hold it in anymore, I snapped. "You don't even know anything about me! All you're doing is just pushing your own wishes and future onto me without considering my feelings!"

"You left your father's business suddenly without any reason, cancelled your own marriage with An-chan for no reason at all and you randomly decide to move out and stay by yourself. YOU tell me which part of this is not half-assed."

"There's a reason for everything I did! You say that I don't have any because you don't know anything about me."

"I am really disappointed in you Ritsu. You have let me down. You have let the family down. This is the end of our conversation."

BEEP BEEP

I switched off my phone in anger and went back to finish up on my project as well as start editing the new manuscript that just came in. The whole time, my mind kept replaying the words my mother had said 'Stop doing everything so half-assed!' 'You have let me down. You have let the family down.'

I was so lost in thought that I didn't notice that worked had ended until Takano-san came to my desk.

"Onodera, it's time to go."

Seeing that it was already 7pm, I quickly packed my bag. Without stuffing the manuscripts into my bag, I started my journey home with Takano-san in silence. The whole ride home, I unconsciously stared at Takano-san's bandaged hand, feeling a pant of guilt and sadness.

When we arrived at our building, Takano-san dragged me into his house to have dinner with him. For some reason, I did not really struggle and just followed him in. Sensing my lack of resistance, Takano-san asked if everything was alright.

"Ya."

He merely acknowledged my response and went to the kitchen to make dinner. While Takano-san was making dinner, I merely stared at the ground, recalling everything my mother said today. I was jolted out of my thoughts when the strong aroma of curry filled the house.

Normally, I would try to break the awkward silence between us but today, the silence was somewhat comforting. After thanking Takano-san for the dinner, I was on my way out when Takano-san said. "Onodera, tell me if anything is bothering you. You seem troubled. You know you can always come talk to me if you need to." I merely nodded a thanks and went back to my apartment, not really absorbing anything his said.


	7. Chapter 7: Not good

The next morning, I was too tired and lazy to avoid Takano-san and ended up going to the office with him. I was seriously drained. I was unable to get a wink of sleep last night as my mother's words had affected me more than I thought. I tried again and again to forget what she said and get some shut eye but no, her words hit me again and again even in my sleep. As a result of that, during the short commute to the office with Takano-san, I had somehow managed to fall asleep on the crowded trains only for Takano-san to wake me up when we reached our stop.

As we walked in silence to our office from the train station, Takano-san broke the silence by asking if I was alright and asking things like was I alright and stuff, saying that I looked horrible. I merely told him that I did not sleep well last night but it would not affect my work one single bit. After saying that, I realised that Takano-san's hand did not have the bandages anymore. I wondered to myself if his hand had recovered and I think I stared because Takano-san chuckled to himself before answering my question.

"My hand is fully recovered, still a little sore but it much better. Oh ya, Yokozawa was wondering if you had finished the proposal for Mutou-sensei's sales project."

"Ah, I'll get it done by today."

As I said that, we had reached our destination and went up to our floor. When we reached our department, Hatori-san greeted the both of us before going over to talk to Takano-san about something. After I put down my bag and turned on my computer to start on Mutou-sensei's project, I was interrupted by Takano-san's exclamation.

"HUH? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? WHY DID THE PRINTERS PUSH THE PUBLISHING DATE EARLIER? WE WON'T BE ABLE TO GET IT DONE ON TIME!"

"I'm not sure boss but they said something like they didn't want our magazine and some new series to be published on the same day so they pushed ours earlier since we are experienced..."

"Ugh, when is the publishing date?" Takano-san said as he pinched the bridge of his nose.

"1 week earlier."

"HUH? STOP JOKING AROUND! 1 WEEK EARLIER? THAT'LL BE SO RUSH FOR US! Especially your sensei since she's always late."

"It's ok boss, I got her to start earlier so I would get it 1 week earlier. I just received her name."

"Ok, the rest of you?"

"I'll be fine!" Kisa-san chirped from his seat.

"Me too." Mino-san said from his seat.

"So that just leaves me and Onodera. Onodera! Do you think you can get your authors to send in her manuscript earlier than planned? Including the new one I assigned you, Satou-sensei?" Takano-san shouted from his desk.

"Satou-sensei alread sent her name in. I'll try to get Mutou-sensei and Saitou-sensei to do so." Honestly I had no confidence that they would be able to finish their work 1 week earlier but I couldn't say no.

"Okay, looks like we'll all be able to do it somehow. Onodera, could you reschedule the plan for the magazine? If you have too much work on your shoulders, I can ask Kisa or Mino to take over." Takano-san didn't even look up to ask me that, he was already starting to call his author.

"No, it's ok. I can do it." 'Is he looking down on me? Does he think that I'm unable to do it? I'll show him that I can do it.' I thought to myself as I picked up the phone to call the authors to inform them of the new change.

After explaining the situation to all 3 of my authors, they all seemed shocked at first but they told me that they would get their work done on time. Despite having reassurance from all my colleagues that they would be able to meet the deadline, I was worried. Worried that someone would miss the deadline, worried that the printers might pushed the deadline earlier, worried that I would not finish my job on time.

Thinking about the amount of work I had; re-planning the magazine schedule, checking all 3 authors manuscripts and Mutou-sensei's sales project; I realised I had no time to get worried. I took in a deep breath and decided to start on rescheduling the magazine as it was the most important and urgent.

When I had finished rescheduling the magazine, which took much longer than normal probably due to my lack of sleep, I printed out the plan and gave it out to everyone for them. Acknowledging that the had received the new plan, they all glanced through and gave me the ok to carry on with my other tasks.

Just as I was about to start Mutou-sensei's proposal for Yokozawa, someone ran in saying that the rankings for the last magazine was out. Even though it was much earlier than normal, nobody seemed to bother about it as we all went to see the rankings.

1\. Ichinose Erika

2\. Yoshikawa Chiharu

3\. Satou Iori

4\. Yamada

5\. Mutou Yukina

'No way... Mutou-sensei moved down...' I could see Kisa-san celebrating beside me but I could not hear anything. It was the first time a author under me moved down on the rankings and it shocked me.

I felt empty.

I slowly went to the vending machine wanting to get a drink, not even noticing a pair of eyes following me. Just as I was about to put a coin into the slot, I stood there dazed for a good minute before I saw someone's hand putting a coin into the machine. I turned around to see Takano-san.

"Don't let the rankings bring you down. Overall everyone's ranking improved so it doesn't really matter, which means the magazine you coordinated was well liked by everyone. Good job."

After saying that, he ruffled my hair and left. I was about to call after him but he just said "It's a treat, get any drink you want." He was trying to cheer me up...

Pressing the button for black coffee, I emptied the can in seconds and went back to inform Mutou-sensei of the rankings. Settling that, I started on Mutou-sensei's proposal.

'Mutou-sensei's position moved down. You have let the family down. You are a failure.'

These thoughts kept swimming in my head even when I was doing the proposal. By the time I was done with it, it was already lunch time and I decided to submit it to Yokozawa-san for him to check.

After dropping it on his desk, I headed out of the office, hoping that I would be able to eat lunch by myself. Sadly luck wasn't on my side as Takano-san was waiting for me outside the building. I really wanted some alone time but it looked like I wasn't going to get any so I just obediently followed him.

As we were about start eating, my phone rang but I rejected it after seeing that it was from my mother. After rejecting her calls 3 times in a row, it seemed that she had given up. Assuring Takano-san that it was nothing, we continued with our meal in silence, only breaking it occasionally to only talk about work related stuff.

After the meal, we went back to the office and headed to our department. When the lift door opened at our floor, I was greeted by:

"ONODERA RITSU! WHERE ARE YOU? YOU CALL THIS A PROPOSAL?!"


	8. Chapter 8: Slightly broken

"ONODERA RITSU! WHERE ARE YOU? YOU CALL THIS A PROPOSAL?!"

"Yokozawa. What are you yelling about?" Takano-san calmly questioned the wild bear. I, instead was incredibly terrified and hid behind him.

"Masamune! Where is your newbie?! The proposal he submitted is rubbish!"

Just as he had finished yelling, he noticed me standing behind Takano-san and immediately pulled me out from behind Takano-san. Losing my 'shield', I had no choice but face the wild bear directly. Even before I could ask what was going on, Yokozawa-san had used a pile of papers which I guessed was my proposal to whack my head.

"Onodera Ritsu! Your proposal is utter rubbish! You told me so boldly that you were not doing anything half-assed but this, this is proof that you are doing things half-assed. Masamune convinced me that you were doing everything wholeheartedly so I decided to listen to him but look at what I got for believing that someone like you could produce good results. Utter rubbish. REDO IT."

During the whole ordeal, I was defenseless and could only stand there with my head down. With every sentence he spoke, the words cut deeper and deeper until I felt absolutely nothing. I didn't even notice that the whole floor was silent and was looking in our direction.

After everything he said, he threw the papers at me before ordering everyone else to get back to work. In my shocked state, I was stood there and watched the pieces of papers spill onto the floor.

I couldn't feel anything. I couldn't hear anything. I couldn't see anything except the stack of papers Takano-san had picked off the ground. The only thing I managed to do was place my hands on the papers. When I felt Takano-san's grip on the papers weakened, I slid them out of his hand and slowly walked back to my desk, completely ignoring the glances everyone threw at me.

Takano POV

It was true when I said that Yokozawa was overreacting. I had never seen him get so worked up over a proposal before. Never. Honestly, I was quite angry when he threw the papers at my first love and would have said something if his anger was so overwhelming. I was seriously scared when he started scolding. As someone who was his close friend, if I was already this scared, what about Ritsu?

I looked in the direction of my first love to check on him only to see that he had not moved at all. I picked up the pieces of paper and started organising them. When I realissed that he still had not moved even after collecting everything, I got worried and called out for him.

"Onodera? Oi Onodera? ONODERA?"

Suddenly, I felt his shaky hand on the paper. I was seriously worried. The stubborn Ritsu who would even scold his own boss was shaking, it was unlike him. I eventually gave him and let him slip the papers out of my hand. Without giving the papers a second glance, he began to slowly walk back to his desk. I followed close behind just in case as of course to give any on-lookers my death-glare.

Onodera POV

Emptiness. That was all that I felt. I just sat there and stared at nothing. After a few minutes, I unconsciously opened my computer to redo the proposal. Normally I would have only taken half an hour to fix it but today I spent 2 hours on it. I don't even know what I was typing, I just typed and typed and typed until I reached the end.

Suddenly, everything came flooding into my head when I saw the -end-.'

'I caused Mutou-sensei's position to move down. I let my family down. I can't even do something as simple as a proposal. I am a utter failure.'

Everything was just making me feel sick. I immediately got up and ran to the toilet with one hand over my mouth, failing to notice that my footsteps somehow had an echo. Even without closing the toilet door, I ran straight into a toilet cubicle and let out everything I ate for lunch. After I was done, I flushed the toilet bowl and slid down to the floor panting.

'What a weakling' I told myself. Just then, I felt someone rubbing circles on my back and I turned around to see Takano-san, worry evident in his eyes. I muttered a quick 'thank you' and walked past him to the sink to wash the acidic after taste off my mouth. When I was done, I realised that Takano-san was still there. He asked me if I was alright and I just nodded as he followed me back to the department.

Turning my full attention to my computer, I realised that I had somehow finished my proposal. I looked through it and thought that it was indeed much better than my previous one so I just saved it. Deciding to email it to Yokozawa-san instead of passing it directly to him, I typed in his email and attached the document and clicked sent.

"Onodera? Why did you send me an email when I'm right here?" Takano-san questioned from behind his wall of books.

I was confused so I looked back to my email outbox only to see that the email address I typed in was Takano-san's instead of Yokozawa-san's.

Before I could apologise to Takano-san, he said "Sending this via email is going to make him even more angry I suggest you pass it to him directly."

Seeing that I had no choice, I planned to put it on his desk after he left. That way, I wouldn't have to see him. Muttering a quick apology to Takano-san, I was about to start checking on the names when Kisa-san suddenly taped my shoulder.

"Ricchan, I think there're some typos in your rescheduling, you typed the dates wrongly."

Looking closely at my rescheduled document, it was true that I wrote the date wrongly. I cursed silently to myself as I went around personally changing the dates on everyone's document. After that was done, I decided to start on Satou-sensei's name.

Editing Satou-sensei's name distracted me and before I knew it, it was already 8pm and everyone had already left. I stuffed her name into my bag and was about to head home when I noticed that my computer was still on. Realising that I had yet to submit the new report, I decided that I would do it tomorrow morning. I grabbed my bag and left the building.

When I reached the apartment, I saw Takano-san leaning against the wall. As I walked towards my apartment, Takano-san pushed himself off the wall and said. "Let's have dinner tonight in my apartment." Before I knew what was happening, I was already standing in the doorway of Takano-san's apartment.

Our dinner was in silence again. After thanking him for the meal, I stood up and was about to go when Takano-san said: "Onodera, regarding your proposal..." I swallowed and turned myself to face him "The one you sent me... still has some areas that could be done better. Let me help you since you are already here."

Being completely drained and exhausted, I agreed and we worked on improving my proposal together. After that was done I went back to my apartment and dropped onto the sofa.

"Great. I can't even manage to keep my author's ranking in place, I can't even live up to my family's expectations and now I can't even do a simple proposal by myself. I really am hopeless and a failure. Ha ha..."

I talked to no one as I took out Satou-sensei's name and started editing. What I didn't know was that there was already a crack in my heart and it wouldn't be long before I lost it...


	9. Chapter 9: Cracking

Editing Satou-sensei's manuscript took me much longer than I had expected. I mean with all the emotions swimming around and pestering me, I had to stop many times when they became so persistent. When I was done, it was already 3 am and I was exhausted. Too lazy and tired to change out of my clothes, I went to my bed and collapsed in it, trying to fall asleep. Just as I was about to drift off to dreamland, I heard my voice speaking to me:

'You can't even manage to keep your author's ranking in place. You can't even live up to your family's expectations. You can't even do a simple proposal by yourself. You are seriously hopeless and useless.'

My eyes shot open and I sat up quickly in my bed. My breathing was ragged and I decided that I wouldn't be getting any sleep so I went back out and continued Satou-sensei's manuscript.

7 am

I hadn't slept the whole night, I was up editing Satou-sensei's manuscript. When I was done, I received 2 mails. One from Saitou-sensei and one from Mutou-sensei. Since Mutou-sensei sent her message slightly earlier, I decided to read hers before Saitou-sensei's.

'Dear Onodera, I have just completed the name, I will fax it to your office at around 8.30am.'

Replying a quick thank you, I went on and opened Saiyou-sensei's mail.

'Dear Onodera, I just faxed my name to your office.'

Similar to Mutou-sensei, I replied a quick thanks before grabbing the redid proposal and Satou-sensei's name before heading out earlier. I hoped that I wouldn't run into Takano-san on the way and Yokozawa-san when I submitted the redid proposal.

Just as I hoped, I was alone and I did not run into either Takano-san or Yokozawa-san along the way. I quickly placed the new proposal on Yokozawa-san's desk and went up to my department to collect the faxed manuscripts. When I reached, I looked over to Takano-san's desk and remembered Hatori-san telling me that I always had to let Takano-san do a final check of any edits made to the names before going back to the authors. I took out Satou-sensei's name and placed it on his desk before walking over to the fax machine behind to collect Saitou-sensei's name.

About an hour later, everyone had arrived and was already starting their work. Takano-san had arrived later than everyone since he was the boss and acknowledged that he received Satou-sensei's work before continuing on his own. As I took a break from editing, I looked around at my fellow co-workers, I could see how sleep deprived and tired most of them were. Leaning back on my chair, I just stared at the ceiling before the sound of fax coming alerted me. It was probably Mutou-sensei's so I got up from my chair and walked over to the fax machine.

Just I had predicted, it was indeed Mutou-sensei's name. As I turned around and was about to walk back to my seat, Takano-san called me over to his desk. "Onodera, your edits are alright but let me highlight some of the things that I feel could be improved..."

By the time he was done explaining, he returned me Satou-sensei's work and told me to look over everything again. I merely took the papers and went back to my seat to continue my work when a thought suddenly stuck my head. 'Takano-san normally doesn't give out suggestions, if he didn't like it or if things were missing, he would have told me to figure it out myself... Does this mean that he has given up on me? Did I do it so badly that he had to intervene?'

I tried to shake these thoughts out of my head so that I could focus on my work but Yokozawa-san just had to come in. He walked over to my desk and said.

"This is called a proposal, not whatever you gave me yesterday. Especially this, this and this. These areas were well done."

After that he left. The parts that he pointed out as well done, those were all done by Takano-san... He has been saving me...

Needing to focus, I went to the vending machine, planning to get a drink to calm myself down. When I was done, I walked back and just before I was about to sit down, Takano-san shouted. "Onodera! Isaka-san just called me and told me that tomorrow we will have a meeting regarding Mutou-sensei's sale! Prepare yourself beforehand!"

"Hai..." Great, one more job on my plate.

At around lunch time, I saw Takano-san walking over towards me probably planning on asking me to join him for lunch. Just then, Yokozawa-san appeared and told Takano-san that they were going to have lunch together. When Takano-san agreed, my eyes shot open and my heart sank a little. 'I can understand. Takano-san doesn't want to have lunch with a loser who can't even do his work properly.'

I shook my head a few times and focused on my work, after all I had 3 names to look through and a meeting to prepare for and very little time. Concluding that lunch would take up too much time, I decided to skip it so I was able to focus on my work.

Somehow, when Takano-san had returned, I had finished re-editing Satou-sensei's work and Saitou-sensei's work. I quickly stood up and passed them to him and went back to continue on Mutou-sensei's.

When I was done with Mutou-sensei's, I went over to Takano-san for him to check. Just when I walked over, he returned me Satou and Saitou-senseis' work having given both the clear. I passed him Mutou-sensei's and faxed both names back to their respective authors. Having a feeling that Takano-san would be done checking Mutou-sensei's work by the time I mailed all 3 authors, I started typing mails to all 3 of them. And I was right. When I just completed typing Mutou-sensei's mail and sending the other 2, Takano-san called me over and gave me the ok. I took the name from him and faxed it to Mutou-sensei before sending the mail.

Feeling really productive, I decided to start planning for the meeting tomorrow. I felt good about myself and was about to go to grab a drink when I heard:

"Did you see Yokozawa scolding that Onodera guy yesterday? Scary..."

"Yeah. But wasn't it Onodera's fault? He knew that Yokozawa would be pissed if the work he received was bad and he still submitted that rubbish."

"Was it that bad?"

"It was horrible. He didn't even check the things properly before submitting it in and most of the things he wrote were all incorrect."

"Wow that bad?"

"Yeah... It was also-"

"Onodera? What are you doing here?"

I turned around to see Takano-san looking at me. Those people who were talking immediately stopped and turning in our direction. Seeing me, they quickly left.

"Nothing... just...just wanted a drink that's all..."

And just like that another crack was added.


	10. Chapter 10: Losing slowly

When the people who were talking about me left, I walked over to the vending machine and just randomly pressed a drink.

'Ah... I could feel a headache coming...' I thought to myself as I gulped down the contents of the can and made my way back to my desk.

The rest of the day just whizzed past and when it was time to head home, I realised that my meeting preparations were completely untouched. Which means, I had to bring it home to complete it, yay. I quickly stuffed the materials into my bag, said a quick goodbye to everyone and headed home.

On the way home, a headache really sprouted and it was really bugging me. Knowing that I had to finish the meeting preparation tonight, I decided to stop by the convenience store to get some medicine for it as well as some dinner.

When I was back in my apartment, I heated up the food I bought from the store and changed out of my clothes. With the food heated, I ate one mouthful before eating the medicine for my headache. I took out my materials and decided to work on my meeting as I ate my dinner.

Seeing my materials sprawled out on the table, I was reminded of the scolding I had received from Yokozawa-san. My mind was immediately filled with the things that occurred over the past week. 'Mutou-sensei's position moved down. I let my family down. I can't do a simple proposal by myself.' "Haha..." I sadly laughed to myself as I thought about all the events that happened over the week. "At this rate, I'll probably mess up my meeting tomorrow as well haha..." I said to no one as I just stared at the ceiling.

The whole time I was doing my preparations, these thoughts kept swimming in my head. Normally, I would only take about an hour to complete my preparations. Looking at the time now, 11pm, I realised that I took 3 hours to complete it. I walked over to my printer and started printing out the relevant things I needed for the meeting, completely forgetting to finish my dinner.

With all the documents printed, I went back to my table and started tidying up when my eyes met my untouched dinner. Seeing only a sad mouthful gone from the box, I realised that I did not eat much and I wasn't exactly hungry so I threw it away. My headache was still there so I decided to let sleep do its' work.

The minute I hit my pillow, my eyelids fell and I drifted off to a fitful sleep.

The next morning, I woke up before my alarm rang. I was honestly still tired as I didn't get a really good sleep but it's alright, I have more important things to focus on. Looking at the date, I ran through the important dates in my head. Today: meeting, 2 days from today: Mutou-sensei's project starts, 5 days from today: Mutou-sensei's project statistics would come out AND deadline for the magazine.

I sighed to myself and at that moment, I realised my headache was still there. I slowly brushed up, took some medicine, stuffed the remaining into my bag and headed to work.

Surprisingly, I did not run into Takano-san even though I left much later than normal. My only guess is that Takano-san left before me. When I reached the office, Takano-san was seating at his desk and doing his own work. I said a soft good morning and sat down in my seat and started calling my authors to check on their progress for the magazine. All the authors were alright with the changes that Takano-san and I had suggested for their name and they were all busy working on the final product. Mutou-sensei seems like she is slightly off track but I'm sure she'll be alright, Saitou-sensei is slightly ahead of schedule and Satou-sensei seems to be on time.

Just as I finished checking in with all my authors, Takano-san called me and we headed to the meeting room. With my head still pounding from my headache, I walked behind Takano-san to the meeting room.

"Okay~ Now that everybody is here, let's start with this meeting~" Isaka-san chirped even though he was the late.

"Looking at her past works, we should print 300,000 copies."

"Huh what are you talking about? That's way too much. 250,000 copies."

"250,000? Don't make me laugh. That's way too little. This author has been climbing up the sales ranking."

"Are you dreaming? She fell in the latest ranking. Obviously we should lower it because of that."

"400,000" Takano-san said.

"That's way to much!"

"Why don't we ask Onodera-kun about his views?" Isaka-san asked in my direction.

"Erm... I agree with Takano-san."

"Ha! Following behind your own boss? Have your own opinion. Useless." Yokozawa-san shouted except the last part, which I heard.

"Even though Mutou-sensei's ranking dropped for the latest ranking, I still feel that the book will sell equally as well as she other books. These were her previous statistics." I handed out the statistics I printed last night, trying to defend my opinion.

"Past statistics are good as references but we should be looking at her ranking too. Seeing that it dropped, I say 370,000 copies would be good. Everyone agree?" Isaka-san said after looking at the statistics.

Everyone in the room nodded and just like that, the meeting ended. Just as I was about to leave with Takano-san, Isaka-san called me to stay behind for a while.

"Onodera-kun, I believe that you have more potential than this. Comparing this meeting to your very first one, the first one was 2 times better than today's one. But then again, you are already doing quite well for someone quite new. Keep up the good work!"

Hearing the new CEO mention that I didn't really do a good job made me feel upset with myself. When Isaka-san left, I was left by myself in the meeting room. I crumpled the documents with me in anger and after awhile, I felt nothing. "Ha... I was right... I messed up my meeting... haha..."

I walked out and decided to inform Mutou-sensei of the new update. Mutou-sensei seemed happy knowing that the number of copies they were ordering was quite high despite her ranking dropping.

After the chat, I slowly made my way back to my desk. I noticed that it was lunch time and everyone had left for lunch. I realised that I wasn't hungry despite not eating any breakfast and my headache had worsened. For the sake of my headache, I went to the nearest convenience store and bought a sandwich. I took a bite from the sandwich and took my medicine. I just sat at my desk and stared at nothing for a good 5 minutes before I ran to the toilet, emptying my 'lunch'.

The rest of the day flew past and I had somehow ended up going home with Takano-san. He had forced me to eat dinner with him at his apartment. Dinner was in complete silence as per usual.

"Onodera, what did Isaka-san say to you after the meeting."

"Huh, oh nothing much." There was no way I'm going to tell Takano-san what he said, he will just laugh at me.

"Okay. By the way, you haven't really touched your food. You feeling ok?"

"Ya ya, I had a really heavy lunch so I'm not that hungry. Thank you for the food." I stood up, grabbed my stuff and was about to leave when...

"Onodera, if you have anything bothering you, even if it's not work related, come talk to me."

"Thank you for your kind offer but I am perfectly fine. Good night."

With all that said, I ran back and vomited the dinner into the toilet bowl. My headache was still there but I didn't reach for the medicine. I just lay on the floor and stared aimlessly at the ceiling.

I was losing myself slowly and I didn't really care. Not like anyone cared.


	11. Chapter 11: On the verge

After throwing up my dinner, I tried to get some sleep. But I couldn't due to my headache that seriously wouldn't go away no matter how much medicine I ate. Realising that I wouldn't be sleeping anytime soon, I decided to watch some TV just to pass the time.

With just a press of a button, the TV flickered to live and the first words were: "You are hopeless!"

"Ha... Even this piece of machinery thought of me this way..."

I knew it wasn't directed to me. It was for the main character in the drama that was showing. Even though I knew that, I could feel it pierce through my heart. I quickly grabbed the remote control and just switched it off. I threw the remote control down onto the sofa and walked back to my bedroom. I just lay there, on my bed, staring at the ceiling. The next few days were going to be super tiring as we each had to go visit our authors and help out in any way we can with their manuscripts. I tired to get some sleep but to no avail, my mind was still running and my headache was still there. 'I hope I last through the remaining few days...' I thought to myself as I closed my eyelids.

The next morning, I had left without eating breakfast again. I knew that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. I know. But I just wasn't hungry so just made a cup of coffee for myself and headed out.

"Good morning."

"Good morning Takano-san."

Just 2 sentences and we were out of our building headed towards our office in complete silence when Takano-san broke it.

"Oi Onodera. Have you been eating? I've been busy these past few days so I was unable to eat with you. And have you been getting sufficient sleep? You have huge eye bags."

"Ah..." I was contemplated on whether to tell Takano-san, "Actually no, I can't eat and can't sleep and I don't know what to do." or "Yeah I'm fine. Completely fine, nothing to worry." I decided on the latter as knowing Takano-san, if I had told him the truth, he would have probably made fun of me and just tease me.

Afterwards, he just asked me what were my plans for the next few days leading up to the deadline. Normally everyone would have the same plans: call author, get the name, edit it and send it back, and whatever extra work we had example proposals. But about a week before the deadline, our plans would be slightly different depending on our authors. For instance, Hatori-san would visit his author the day he sends back the edited name and thereafter frequently visit her to ensure that she was on task. For Kisa-san, he rarely meets up with his author so he would stay in the office and just discuss with them there. For Takano-san, he would have lunch with his authors and run through the edits with them. So everyone has different plans during the last week.

"Today I'm visiting Mutou-sensei since she was slightly behind schedule the last I checked with her. Tomorrow Satou-sensei. And the day after Saitou-sensei. 2 days from today is the deadline so I will most likely be in the office unless one of my authors needs an additional pair of hands."

"Hmm... okay."

At the office, I quickly grabbed my materials and left to Mutou-sensei's place.

"Ah Onodera-kun, thank you for coming. Come in come in."

"Thank you Mutou-sensei. How much work do you have left?"

"Hmm we completed 29 pages, 6 blank pages and 11 pages without backgrounds. Could you help with the backgrounds?"

"Sure."

And we started work.

At around lunch time, Mutou-sensei and her assistants decided to go to a fast food restaurant to grab something quick to eat. Me, I wasn't hungry so I told them to go ahead first. I just continued my work. When they all came back, they asked if I had eaten and I just told them I did.

I worked with them until the evening time. I headed home and decided that I should just grab some eat food like a sandwich from the convenience store before heading home. I ate a mouthful and didn't feel like eating afterwards. Surprisingly I did not vomit that night but I was still unable to sleep so I stayed up and just watched anything the TV played.

Finally at around 3am, I decided to just lie on my bed to rest for a while. When I closed my eyes, I was in my dreamland where everything was nice and bright. I thought to myself how nice it was. Just then, all the words I tried to forget came back and haunted me. 'Mutou-sensei's position moved down. I let my family down. I can't do a simple proposal by myself. I messed up my meeting. The CEO of the company thinks that I'm not good enough.'

I jolted out of my sleep and turned to my clock. 5am. Well, at least I was able to sleep for 2 hours, it's better than nothing. From 5 to 7, I just lay on my bed and stared at the ceiling, not really thinking about anything. At 7, I got up and started my day.

Just like that, my past 3 days have been the same; wake up, run into Takano-san at the train station, awkward conversations, reach office, grab my stuff, go to authors house, come back home, eat a light snack, watch TV, try to sleep, sleep for 2 hours, stone for 2 more hours, wake up and repeat.

It may seen boring and monotonous but I liked it. Surprisingly Takano-san did not insist that I eat dinner with him for the past few nights, probably because he was busy with his own work. I'm grateful for that, I don't want him to tease me afterall.

Today was the big day. First, the release of Mutou-sensei's project sales at lunch time and the deadline of the magazine at 6pm. So far, all my authors seemed to be on time and they didn't need my help so I decided to head to the office. Just as I was about to leave my house. My phone rang. I simply assumed that it was one of my authors who realised they needed some last minute help.

"Hello. Onodera speaking."

"Are you done ignoring me and running away from your own responsibilities?"

"Mother..."

"So Ritsu? First you reject An-chan without any reason and now you even need your own CEO to worry about you?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Your father and the former CEO of the company that you are working at now are close friends. The former CEO was just asking his son about his company when you had to be mentioned. If it was something praise worthy, I would have called to congratulate you. But NO. You had to make a fool of yourself in front of your CEO. Your father knows about this as well since the former CEO was the one who told him about you. He said something like 'Onodera has yet to unleash his full potential' You tarnished the Onodera name. But then again what am I expecting from someone who does all his work so half-assed. I'm not even surprised."

"Wha-"

"And DON'T tell me that you have never done anything half-assed. I'm seriously disappointed, your father and I went all out to try and provide the best for you in hopes that you would do well and take over the company and lead the company to success. We even agreed with your stupid plan of sending you overseas to England even without a valid reason. Enough running Ritsu, you are just tarnishing our family name."

"Will you stop and let me sa-"

"No. I'm not going to listen to any more of your excuses. I've given you so many chances and you've let me down for ALL of them. Onodera Ritsu, until you fix your horrible problems and get your act back together, you are no longer an Onodera."

BEEP BEEP BEEP

I just stood there with my phone still at my ear even after my mother cut her call.

1 more push

All I needed was one more push and I would break. But who am I kidding, no one cares anyway. Not even my family... wait I don't even have one anymore.


	12. Chapter 12: Fallen

Today was the big day, and it was already terrible. I took in a deep breath and turned off my phone, quickly packed my bag and was about to leave when I heard a knock on the door.

"Onodera? Are you still in there?"

"Yes." 'What does he want with me?'

"Have you eaten breakfast?"

"Yes." 'I lied.'

"Let's go to work together."

Knowing that I would be unable to escape from Takano-san, I opened my door to see my neighbor eating a sandwich. I stepped out and began our journey to our office. As per usual, our journey was silent except for a short questions about work. Today was going to be a busy day. Mutou-sensei's project's sales results would be out at lunch time and the deadline for the magazine is at 6pm. So that meant that we would be getting many manuscripts throughout the whole day as none of the authors were able to finish before the sudden shortening of the deadline. I'm not complaining, just saying that it was going to be a busy day.

And I was right, the minute we entered our department, Kisa-san ran from the fax machine to Mino-san's desk, Takano-san's desk, my desk and finally back to his.

"Ah good morning Takano-san, Richhan. Some manuscripts just came in, Ichinose Erika's and Satou Iori's."

"Thank you Kisa." Takano said as he walked over to his desk to do a last check of his authors work.

I muttered a quick thank you to Kisa-san, sat down at my desk and started checking Satou-sensei's work. Seeing that everything was alright, I decided to check on Mutou-sensei and Saitou-sensei. I picked up the phone on my desk and started calling the both of them. After being assured that I would receive both of their manuscripts by 5.30pm, I placed the phone back onto the receiver. I took a quick look around my department, everyone looked horrible.

Kisa-san was lying on his desk and checking his work, Hatori-san had just ended his call with his author and was resting his head in his hands. Mino-san was still smiling like always and Takano-san rested his head with one hand while checking his author's work with his other. Everyone had huge eye bags and they looked horrible.

"Onodera, I've checked Erika-sensei's manuscript, do a final check. Also, let me check Satou-sensei's work."

"Ah Richhan, I'm done with mine too. Thanks."

I got up and walked over to the both of them to collect their manuscripts. Being the magazine coordinator, Takano-san had informed me that I would be doing the final checks for all the authors and arranging all of them in order before giving it to the printers. However, Takano-san had ordered that I wouldn't be doing the final checks for my authors. Takano-san would be doing that. Doing final checks meant that I had to ensure that the story flowed well, everything was alright. Normally, there wouldn't be any changes as it would be too close to the deadline.

Just as I had finished checking Kisa-san's author's work, Takano-san called me over.

"Onodera, this part seems alittle rushed. This author's style is slightly different and this is your first time editing so just take note."

"Okay, thank you." I think this was the first time something like this was mentioned so close to the deadline...

I collected my manuscripts and headed back to my seat. Back at my desk, I saw 2 more sets of manuscripts, 1 from Mino-san and 1 from Kisa-san. I sighed and started my work.

Without knowing time flew past and by the time I was done checking all the manuscripts I had received in morning, it was lunch time. Everyone else had left for lunch except for me and Takano-san. Just as I had placed the last manuscript that I was checking down, someone from the sales department ran in and passed me and Takano-san the statistics for Mutou-sensei's project.

Mutou sensei's 2nd book sale:

Ordered: 370,000

Sold: 350,000

Left: 2,000

New order: 200,000

Seeing this, I quickly messaged Mutou-sensei and updated her. As I was telling her the statistics, I recalled the last project for her. I somehow remembered the data to be much better. Reminding her to submit her work by the deadline, I hung up and tried to find the old statistics for her previous project.

Mutou sensei's 1st book sale:

Ordered: 300,000

Sold: 290,000

Left: 1,000

New order: 250,000

I was right, her sales were much better in her first project...

"Onodera, did you receive the statistics for Mutou-sensei's-"

"Yeah. I'm going to go get a drink first." Before Takano-san could protest, I had left my desk and was walking towards the vending machine. I shoved in 2 coins, pressed a random drink and chugged down the can as quickly as I could. I took a few deep breaths and was about to turn when I heard.

"Hey did you hear this morning? Takano-san mentioned somehing about Onodera-san's work being not up to standard or something."

"Wait, that Onodera again? Wasn't the dealdine for their magazine today? Gosh..."

"Ya... he's realy out of it, I don't understand why his here, he'a not cut out for this kind of work anyway. Besides, now we can confirm that despite all the rumors that said that 'Onodera's work is amazing and that he's working is hardest' are all not true."

"The main reason he was accepted into this company was probably because he's the next heir to Onodera publishing. Lame."

I didn't want to hear anymore so I decided to make my way back to my desk. Just as I was about to round the corner and walk back to my desk, I heard Yokozawa-san's voice.

"This time's sales results were much lower than the last one's."

"Ya..." That was Takano-san.

"Maybe it has something to do with the storyboard."

"Are you saying that her sales dropped because of my department? Because of Onodera's editing?"

"I'm just saying a maybe. Afterall, the initial report he gave was utter rubbish. The second one he gave, he probably asked for some help. Comparing the second one to the proposal for the first project, this was done much neater and much better. It doesn't make sense how he could turn rubbish into something that good. He probably got some help."

At this point, I couldn't hold it in any more. The multiple cracks had accumulated and broke me apart. Without knwoing what exactly I was doing, I quickly rounded the corner, breifly seeing Takano-san and Yokozawa-san, not stopping and just continuing to run. I could hear Takano-san shouting something at me but I didn't care, I just ignored him and dashed straight for the stairs.

"Dangit dangit dangit!" I shouted to no one as I ran down the stairs. Everything is just mushed up together. Everything that everyone has been saying to me just echoed in my ears as I continued running down the stairs. 'You injured Takano-san. You couldn't maintain your author's position. You let your family down. You can't do a simple proposal by yourself. Your family doesn't want you anymore. You can't edit. You can't do anything right. You're hopeless. You're useless.'

I could feel the tears threatening to fall any second, I shielded my eyes with my arm and continued running. I ran as hard as I could, without stopping even once to catch my breath or to check for any traffic while running across the roads. I ignored all the shouts and words directed at me. I just ran. Ran without any destination in my mind.

When I somehow reached a park, the tears had long fallen and I lost all strength in my legs. Luckly, there was no one there. I just sat there and let my tears drip onto the floor. I saw the light pavement turn darker and darker with each tear that fell. It seems that anything associated to me, even just by me touching it made everything worse.

"I'M SUCH A FAILURE. I'M USELESS. I'M HOPELESS." I shouted as the tears blurred my vision of my hands punching the ground, completely ignoring the pain that came with it. I continued to punch, completely unaware that my hands had started bleeding.

After a while, I stopped punching and help my hands infront of my eyes. Seeing the red liquid covering the back of my hand, I burried my head in my hands and hugged myself as I subconsciously said:

"No one needs me. No one cares about me. No one understands me. Haha... Maybe I should just do everyone a favor and just die..."


	13. Chapter 13: Gone

"Maybe I should just do everyone a favor and just die...Haha..."

I felt nothing. Absolutely nothing. I just sat there laughing to myself, ignoring everything else around me. I didn't even realise that it had started to rain. I just sat there with the rainwater falling down my face mixing with my tears. The unfamiliar salty taste on my tongue didn't bother me as I continued to laugh silently to myself.

"-dera! Ono-! Onodera! Onodera!"

Someone was calling my name but the rain had started falling heavily and drowned out the sounds I heard. My clothes were soaked and I was drenched but I didn't care. I was more intrigued with what I heard. I thought I heard someone calling my name. But then again, why would anyone want or bother to come looking for a failure. I just covered my ears and closed my eyes, hoping that my 'nightmare' would end soon.

Takano POV

I was busy talking to Yokozawa about Onodera's sales result. I was honestly quite worried about him, he looked much thinner and paler than normal but if he didn't want to talk about it I wouldn't force him to. I knew that he would probably blame himself for the drop in Mutou-sensei's sales. I knew it. And yet I didn't tell him not to worry about it.

Just then, Yokozawa's voice shook me out of my thoughts. "This time's sales results were much lower than the last one's."

"Ya..."

"Maybe it has something to do with the storyboard."

"Are you saying that her sales dropped because of my department? Because of Onodera's editing?" I said quite angrily. No one. And I mean NO ONE insults my department or the people in my department. No one in my department isn't doing his best. Everyone in my department is doing the best they can, especially Onodera.

"I'm just saying a maybe. Afterall, the initial report he gave was utter rubbish. The second one he gave, he probably asked for some help. Comparing the second one to the proposal for the first project, this was done much neater and much better. It doesn't make sense how he could turn rubbish into something that good. He probably got some help."

I was about to tell him off, tell him very nicely that Onoodera did not get any help and did everything based on his own merits. But I was interrupted by someone running past us. His head was cast downwards so I couldn't see his face but his light brown hair caught my attention. Normally, I wouldn't be able to recognise people without seeing their face. But this guy, the guy who ran past me like as though I wasn't there, I recognised him. It was Onodera. No mistake, I would never mistake his light silky brown hair for anyone else.

"Oi! Onodera! Onodera!"

I was about to run after him when I felt someone hold my wrist.

"Yokozawa. What are you doing? Let go."

"Why. Why do you want to go after him. After someone who hurt so many times."

"Huh? What are you talking about? Onodera would never hurt anyone."

"Then would you like to tell me who was it that made depressed 10 years ago. Who was the one that constantly hurt you for the past 10 years. Who was the one that injured your hand!"

"Onodera never injured my hand, I did that to myself. And the incident 10 years ago was inevitable. It wasn't anyone's fault, it was just a misconception that we cleared long ago."

"Fine. But why do you want to go after someone who can't even produce results? He does his work so half-assed. Why don't you just let him go and fine other people who are willing to do their job wholeheartedly. He's not essential to this company."

"Onodera Ritsu is someone who doesn't do his work half-assed. He is the most diligent and hardworking worker I have in my whole department. Do not insult my lover!"

The minute I said the word 'lover' Yokozawa's grip loosened and I yanked my hand out of Yokozawa's grip. I started running after Onodera, leaving Yokozawa standing there dazed.

I ran to the staircase and ran all the way to the first floor. No one was there so I just looked around me. Suddenly, my eyes were drawn to light brown hair running towards the park through the glass doors. I pushed the glass doors out of my way and tried to follow him. Man, he was running really fast.

Even though I was quite far behind him, I could see that he did not really look out for traffic and just dashed across the road recklessly. What an idiot I thought to myself. From my distance, I could see that he had entered the park. I dashed after him, while looking out for traffic of course.

When I entered the park, it had started drizzling. I couldn't see him anywhere so I started calling out for him and running in all directions. I was tired from all the running, but I couldn't stop now. I needed to make sure that Onodera was fine. Realising that running around and calling out for him wouldn't make him come out, I asked a few people around me if they saw someone with light brown hair running pass them. To my luck, the second person I asked saw him and pointed me in the direction where Onodera ran.

Now it had started pouring and I was getting really worried. I started calling for him even though I knew the rain would drown out most of my voice, I just shouted louder and louder. My eyes scanned the park. Suddenly, I saw someone sitting on the ground with his hands over his ears. I couldn't see really well through the rain but I managed to see light brown hair and something red on his hand. Was he bleeding?

"Onodera?" I called out carefully as I slowly approached him.

When I was just behind him, I gently placed my hand on his shoulder. He flinched.

Onodera POV

Suddenly, I felt someone's hand on my shoulder. I reflexively flinched and I could hear gentle words asking me what happened to me but I didn't move. I just sat in the same position.

I felt that hand leave my shoulder and I saw footsteps coming into my view. I looked down, still confused about everything. I felt the hand on my shoulder again and I decided to look up.

I came face to face with a red faced Takano-san. His mouth was slightly agape and his eyes were wider than normal. His clothes and hair was completely wet too. I just stared at him, unable to move or say anything.

"Ono...dera? What happened? Are you okay?"

"DON'T TOUCH ME!" I shouted as a new batch of fresh tears came pouring out of my eyes. Takano-san's hand left my shoulder. "Don't touch me... leave me alone... nobody needs me... nobody wants me... nobody wants to associate themselves with a useless person... nobody cares..."

"Onodera... what are you saying... there are people who care about you like your family."

"Haha... I don't have one anymore... they... disowned... me..." I started crying uncontrollably. I didn't even notice that Takano-san had hugged me and was rubbing soothing circles on my back. We just stayed there while I cried. Everything was just so overwhelming. I didn't want to think. I didn't want to fee. I didn't want to breathe anymore.

After I emptied my tears, Takano-san was still hugging me until I completely stopped sniffling. When he pulled away, he looked me straight into my eyes and said. "Onodera. You alright? Have you calmed down slightly?"

I just nodded.

"Let's find some shelter first shall we?"

I nodded.

"Are you alright with going back to the office? We need to change out of our clothes."

Takano-san stood up and extended his hand. I instinctively reached out my hand and let him pull me out. He held onto my hand as we made our out of the park. The whole time, my eyes were downcast and I still felt absolutely nothing. When we reached a more crowded area of the park, he had let go of my hand and we just walked side by side back to the office.

When we reached the traffic light. I saw the red man. I saw a lorry speeding down the road. I just wanted to end everything. I didn't want anything anymore. I saw Takano-san stop and wait for the lights to turn green.

Seeing the lorry speeding down on the lane closest to where we stood, my legs instinctively moved by itself and I started walking onto the road.

"ONODERA!"

The last thing I heard was someone shouting my name and my view switched from the road to the sky. Suddenly, Takano-san's face came into my view and I could feel him trying to sit me up.

"What the hell were you doing? Are you trying to kill yourself?"

I just sat there for a good few minutes. Not answering Takano-san's questions. After that, my vision started getting blurry as a new batch of tears flowed out of my eyes and I slowly nodded.

Almost instantly, I could someone hugging me and calling me a baka. But I just sat there, not feeling anything with tears flowing down my face, not moving.

"Why... why didn't you... let me... die..."

"Why would I?"

"Because nobody needs a useless person like me... I wouldn't be troubling anyone else anymore... and... and I wouldn't have to deal with anyone anymore... wouldn't that be great... haha..."

I just sat there not moving, my tears just flowed down my face as I laughed with no emotions whatsoever. Takano-san was still hugging me, but he had tightened his hug. The rain was still pouring liek a torrent but we just sat there in that position not moving, not caring if anyone stared.

"Onodera... what happened to you..."


	14. Chapter 14: Cuts

"Onodera... what happened to you..."

Even though Takano-san had whispered it to no one in particular, it was the only sound I heard. The rain had drained everything else and his gentle voice was all that my ears heard. It was soft, gentle but it was sad. His gentle voice sent warm chills down my spine as he hugged me, not moving. I could feel the rain droplets landing gently on me, completely different from the painful assault I felt when I was running. I could feel many eyes looking at us but I didn't care. It was warm and gentle, something I haven't felt in the longest time and I didn't want it to end.

After a few minutes, Takano-san let go of me and I immediately felt the cold hit me with the assist of the rain. Takano-san extended his hand and offered to pull me up but all I could do was just stare at him blankly, not being able to do anything else. Before I realised, Takano-san had bent down and was now looking at me in the eye. His strong hands supported me under my arms as he pulled me up from the cold floor. When I was completely off the floor and didn't have to rely on him to stand, his hand slipped into my own and he held it tightly, firmly and yet gently. With our fingers intertwined, we began walking back to the office slowly.

The walk back to the office was long and painfully silent, normally I wouldn't allow Takano-san to hold my hand but today, his hand gave me warmth and I didn't struggle as he led me back to the office. My ears had shut out all sounds around me. I could see the rain forming ripples when it landed in a puddle, I could see cars driving past but I couldn't hear anything.

When we finally reached the office, Takano-san let go of my hands but placed his hands on my shoulder instead. He guided me via my shoulder towards the lift and once we reached our floor, to the toilet. Along the way, I heard Kisa-san voice coming from our department.

"Wah Takano-san and Ricchan! You're both soaking wet! Did you get caught in that heavy rain?" I kept my eyes downcast.

"Ya. We're going to the toilet to dry off."

"Kays~"

In the toilet, Takano-san closed and locked the door. Afterwards, he gently tugged me towards the hand drier and made me sit down below it. He waved his hand above my head and the hand drier roared to life. I could feel his huge hands slowly massaging my head as he tried to dry it. When we were done, Takano-san pulled me slowly to the sink to wash my hands which was covered in blood.

When that he done, he inspected my hands and found out that the wound had stopped bleedind. Feeling satusfied with what he saw, Takano-san bent down and asked me: "Onodera, we have to dry your shirt or you're going to catch a cold. Do you want me to do if for you?"

I shook my head.

I muttered a soft okay and saw him walk over to the other hand drier. As the other hand drier echoed in the toilet, I took off my shirt and tried to dry it. My eyes never leaving my shirt or the ground. When my shirt was dried enough, I quickly put on my shirt only to see that Takano-san was done and waiting for me.

"Onodera, are you alright."

"Just call me if you need me."

I nodded and we both headed back to our department with me following behind him. Along the way, I saw the group of people who were talking about me at the vending machine and I immediately shot my gaze downwards back to the floor. They were talking happily among themselves but when they saw me and Takano-san, they stopped and started whispering to each other. I really wanted to dig a hole in the floor and hide myself there but sadly I couldn't so I just tried as best as I could to walk faster with my head still downcast. When we passed them, they muttered a quick greeting to Takano-san and quickly walked in the other direction, much to my relief.

Back at our department, everyone was back from their lunch break and was already getting started on their work. I 2 stacks of papers on my desk, one much taller and thicker than the other. I realised that the smaller pile was probably Mutou-sensei and Saitou-sensei's manuscripts and the thicker one was the other author's manuscripts. Before Takano-san could walk back to his seat, I quietly passed him Mutou-sensei and Saitou-sensei's manuscript and he muttered a quick thank you before walking back to his seat.

I slumped down on my seat and saw the whole pile of papers. Normally I would sigh and get a headache but this time I just started checking without saying anything else. When I was done checking the first two manuscripts, Takano-san had also finished checking both Mutou-sensei and Saitou-sensei's work so he passed it back to me. I didn't even look up at him when I received the manuscripts.

"Everyone, can we have a quick meeting? Ah Onodera we will fill you in with the details after the deadline. You just continue doing what you need to do."

"Takano-sannnnn why can't we have the meeting after the deadline? The Ricchan can join us."

"This is important. Meeting room 3 now!"

And before I knew it, the room was emptied. I just continued on my work.

In the meeting room, no ones POV

"Ok, this is a very important matter and whatever I say stays in this four walls understand?" Takano said with seriousness in his voice.

Everyone in the room nodded.

"Just now during lunch, Onodera ran out of the office. When I found him, he was crying and his hands were bleeding."

pauce*

"After I somehow managed to convince him to come back to the office, we were at this traffic light. When I took my eyes off of him for just a second, the next thing I saw was him walking towards this lorry that was speeding down. I pulled him back in time. When I asked what was he doing, he asked me why didn't I ley him die. Afterwards, he mentioned that he was useless and a failure and that his death would benefit everyone."

At this point, Kisa gasped. Hatori and Mino just stood there eyes widened from shock. Takano took in a deep breath and continued.

"My guess is that something happened to Onodera but I'm not sure what it is. And that something is causing him to have suicidal thoughts. So for the remainder of today, I want at least 1 person to be with him no matter where he goes just to make sure he doesn't do anything. Alright?"

Seriousness filled the room as all of them nodded their head in agreement. Worry was evident in all their faces especially Kisa since he was quite close to Onodera. After assuring everyone that he would bring Onodera to a doctor after the deadline, Takano dismissed everyone. He stayed in the room for a while trying to think of things that may have caused his lover to fall into such a state when he heard Kisa shout.

"Ricchan! What are you doing! Oi! RICCHAN!"

Takano immediatly ran out of the room towards the department. When he saw what Kisa was shouting about, he ran towards Onodera and placed his hand on Onodera's shoulder before shouting.

"Onodera! Snap out of it!"

Onodera POV

I saw all my colleges leave for the meeting room while I still sat at my seat checking the manuscripts. Even though I still felt horrible, I knew that I had to do whatever I had to do and just pressed on with checking the manuscripts. When I was half way done, my eyes drifted back to the meeting room and they still had not come out yet. My eyes wandered back to my desk with the stack of manuscripts. Just as I was about to pick up the next manuscript to check, I spotted something glistening at the corner of my desk. I reached out my right hand and found out that it was a penknife with the blade still out.

'This is dangerous' I thought to myself as I held it in my hand. As I stared harder and harder at the blade, my hand holding the blade unconsciously moved over to my left hand. Before I could process what I was doing, a cut had formed on my wrist and blood was oozing out from it. Surprisingly, I didn't feel any pain. I just sat there holding the blade in one hand with my other hand bleeding as I stared into nothing. Unconsciously, my right hand found it's way back to the left hand and another cut was formed.

"Onodera! Snap out of it!"

I blinked and turned to see Takano-san holding my shoulder with his eyes widened. I saw Kisa-san, Hatori-san and Mino-san standing behind him, all their faces pale. I felt something warm on my left hand and I saw the 2 cuts with blood oozing out from them. My eyes widened and Takano-san asked me: "Onodera... what were you doing..."

"I... I... I don't know..."

"Ri-ricchan... did you... not hear... me?..."

I turned to Kisa-san and shook my head slowly, shock still evident on everyone's faces. Afterwards, Mino-san, Kisa-san and Takano-san took over my joba dn helped to check the other manuscripts while Hatori-san brought me to the rest room to patch up my wrists.

When Hatori-san was done patching my wounds, I mumbled a quick thank you as he packed up. Suddenly, he asked me: "Onodera, did you know what you were doing?"

"No... Hatori-san, can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"Is... is it supposed to hurt... or feel comforting... when you cut? Because... somehow I don't know what I was doing... but it was calming and somewat soothing..."

I turned to Hatori-san when I heard him drop the bandages. His eyes were widened and his mouth was slightly agape. Shock written clearly all across his face. Did I say something weird?


	15. Chapter 15: Missing

It was strange. I've never seen Hatori-san so shocked before. His eyes were wide open and his mouth was slightly agape as he just stared at me. Did I really ask or say something weird?

"Hatori-san? Um... Hatori-san?" I asked as I waved my hand in front of his face.

Hatori-san blinked a few times and still maintained his eye contact with me ask he replied me. "Ah sorry Onodera-kun. Normally it's supposed to hurt, but don't worry about it. Different people have different feelings. Now that you're all patched up, shall we head back?"

A gentle smile lined his face as he reached out his hand towards me to help me up. I gratefully accepted it and walked back to the department behind Hatori-san. The minute we stepped into our department, Kisa-san ran past Hatori-san and pulled me into a tght hug.

"Ricchan~ Don't ever do something like that again! You scared all of us when you didn't even react to my voice." A few stray tears had dripped down his face as he hugged me even tighter.

"Sorry..."

Kisa-san released me from his hug and we all went back to doing our own work. I sat down and noticed that there were fewer stacks of paper on my pile of 'unchecked' manuscripts. My 'checked' manuscripts piled had grown taller in the short time I was gone too. Guessing that it was Takano-san, Mino-san and Kisa-san's doing, a small smile laced my face, feeling grateful for my colleges.

I decided to start by arranging the 'checked' pile in the right order. When that was done, I went to pick up a new stack of papers from the 'unchecked' pile and started checking through the work. Everyone was busy doing their own work, most of them were calling their respective authors and thanking them for doing everything within the shortened deadline and told them to rest well.

Just as I was checking the manuscript and thinking that everything was somewhat peaceful, I heard a sneeze coming from Kisa-san's direction. I turned to that general direction to see that the sneeze did not come from Kisa-san, it was from Takano-san. Takano-san was pitching his nose with his thumb and index finger, trying to control his sneeze as much as he could. When he felt that the sneeze wouldn't come back, he released his hand and continued his work as if nothing had happened.

By the time I was done with that particular manuscript, Takano-san had roughly sneezed about 4 times in that short time. As I was putting the checked manuscript to where it was supposed to be I overheard Hatori-san talking to Takano-san. Being slightly curious, I turned my head in their direction.

"Takano-san, your face is slightly red. Do you have a cold? You've been sneezing non stop."

"Maybe. I'm not really sure."

"Where you caught in that downpour?"

"Yeah."

"Maybe that's the reason."

At that moment, Takano-san immediately looked up and looked me straight in the eye. I jumped slightly and turned back to my work. I heard a chair being pushed back and footsteps coming closer to my direction.

"I don't think so. If anything, this cold was from last time. The rain just might have triggered it a little. I'm going to get some coffee, anyone wants?"

"I see. No thanks." Hatori-san replied.

"No thank you Takano-san." Mino-san replied cheerfully.

"Me please!" Kisa-san practically bounced while shouting.

"No thanks." I replied, not looking up.

When Takano-san passed my desk, I heard him whisper, "Don't blame yourself, it's not your fault." And he walked towards the vending machine.

I took in a deep breath, trying to compose myself to focus on my work. Shortly later, Takano-san came back with Yokozawa-san behind him. They were talking about the ranting result date for this magazine that we were currently working on. I turned around, slightly curious. When Yokozawa-san's eyes met mine, he stopped talking and said. "If you have the time to be curious about other people's conversation, I suggest you use that time to buck up on your work." I immediately turned around and continued doing whatever I was doing, blocking out all the other sounds around me.

"You're horrible!" 'You're useless. You're hopeless. You're lousy. You only cause more problems for other people. Nobody wants you.'

The first 2 words on the next page of the manuscript I was checking was 'You're horrible!'. It also showed the female character slapping the male character. Even though I knew that it wasn't directed at me, I couldn't help but feel that it was. I knew that it wasn't. I knew it. But why did it still hurt. It feels as if I was the male character that was slapped and the female character was everyone else. It hurt. It wasn't directed at me but, it still hurt. It hurt a lot. I could feel the tears threatening to show themselves. I knew that know wasn't the time to get emotional, I knew, so I took in a deep breath and calmed myself. Pushing away any other thoughts, I focused on the piece of manuscript in my hands.

Takano POV

"If you have the time to be curious about other people's conversation, I suggest you use that time to buck up on your work."

When Yokozawa said that, I immediately turned and glared at him.

"Why did you say that?"

"Huh? Because it's true."

"I told you to not insult him! If you have no other business here please leave." I could feel my voice increasing in volume as I glared daggers at him. Even though Yokozawa was my best friend, he still insulted Onodera. He insulted my lover. He insulted MY Onodera Ritsu! I wasn't going to let that slide.

I guess he knew that I was pissed as he just turned around and left after I said that. I turned my head back to Onodera. He didn't even react when I raised my voice in anger. I wanted to ask him if everything was alright but seeing him so focused on his work, I just couldn't bring myself to disturb or break his concentration. So I just sighed and walked back to my desk.

Onodera POV

I saw Takano-san walking back to his seat but I didn't care. I just continued working on whatever I had to do.

It was currently 5.50pm and I was already checking the last stack of manuscripts. Just when I finished, the printers called and asked where the manuscripts. I just calmly replied them saying that it wasn't 6pm yet. I arranged all the manuscripts in place and went over to Takano-san for him to do a real quick scan of the order. In 2 minutes, Takano-san had checked and okay-ed the manuscripts. I took them and went back to my desk to grab my stuff and was about to leave the office when I heard.

"Onodera wait!"

I turned around to face Takano-san and he just continued. "Kisa will go with you." I was slightly curious as to why Kisa was coming with me, normally I would go alone but I just brushed it off and walked to the printers with Kisa-san.

While walking to the printers, Kisa-san kept talking non stop about this drama he saw on the TV last night. Even though I had no idea what he was talking about, it was nice to just listen to his voice. When he finally stopped talking, I decided to ask him why Takano-san asked him to come with me to the printers.

"Huh. Oh I needed to drop by the bookstore near our office to uh check on something. So Takano-san suggested that I follow you so that I can go straight there and maybe if you want you can come with me?"

"Oh okay, sure I can go with you."

After dropping off the manuscripts at the printers on the dot, we walked over to the bookstore. We both went down to the Shojo manga section and after fixing a time and place to meet afterwards, we split our ways. As I walked through the bookstore, from the corner of my eye, I could see Kisa-san talking to this really handsome worker. They looked close, maybe they were friends? I just shrugged it off and just continued walking.

As I just strolled, something caught my eye. It looked like a little stand with lots of flowers. I decided to take a closer look. Walking closer to the pink aura, I saw that it was actually my project. Wow they did it pretty well. Just as I was about to walk to take a closer look, a group of school girls walked over to the stand and started looking through the manga. Seeing people actually reading the work I edited made me happy.

Sadly, my moment of bliss was shattered. "This chapter seems less captivating than the previous one..."

"I know right... but the art and everything is still quite good..."

"True... it would've been better if the author did this at this part."

"Ya ya it would be sooooo much better!"

I just stood there, staring at the stand. School girls were talking about how they would've edited my work. I felt insulted. I immediately turned and ran back to the office, completely forgetting the promised time and place to meet Kisa-san. I just ran and ran. It had stopped raining but dark clouds still hung in the sky.

When I entered the office, I just ran up the stairs. Wanting to get away from people, I just continued running upwards.

Kisa POV

"Sorry Yukina, I've got to go. I promised my co-worker that I'd meet him in 1 minute outside the bookstore."

"Kisa-san... are you cheating on me?.. Did you just come here to tell me that?.." Yukina pouted when I mentioned 'him'.

"No! It's just some stuff happened at work just now and I've been tasked to look after him while we were out. I came because... I... missed... you..."

"Are you alright Kisa-san? Did anything happen to you?" Worry was evident in his voice as he held my shoulders and bombarded me with questions.

"I'm fine but my co-worker, not really. I've really got to go now. I'll meet you later."

"See you later Kisa-san~ I missed you too!" Yukina called waving his arms with a big smile on his face.

'He's so cute~' I thought to myself as I walked to the place where I was supposed to meet Ricchan.

I walked outside the bookstore and waited for Ricchan to come out. After 5 minutes, Ricchan still hasn't come out yet. I was getting worried, Ricchan would never be late unless he over slept which can't be the case now. I ran back into the store and went back down to the Shojo manga section.

"Yukina!"

"Kisa-san? Why are you back so early? Did you forget something?"

"No, did you see a middle-aged man with light brown hair and emerald eyes? He's slightly taller than me but shorter than you."

"Middle-aged man with light brown hair? I don't think so... Kisa-san! Where are you going?"

"Sorry! I'll call you later!" I yelled as I ran out trying to take out my phone at the same time.

When I finally got my phone out, I quickly called Takano-san's number. While it was ringing I thought to myself, 'I'm so dead so so so dead. Takano-san is going to kill me!' "Hello, Takano here."

"Takano-san! Is Ricchan at the office?"

"Huh. Isn't he with you?"

"NO! TAKANO-SAN I CAN'T FIND RICCHAN!"


	16. Chapter 16: Finding Onodera

Takano POV

"I CAN'T FIND RICCHAN!"

What... what did Kisa just say? He can't find Onodera? Aren't they together?

"Takano-san... are you... still there..."

"YES I AM!" I unconsciously yelled into the phone. When I heard a small squeak on the other end of the call, I realised that I raised my volume too much. I coughed and continued, "Sorry. Where are you right now?"

"At the bookstore near our office. I've searched the whole bookstore but I can't find him." Kisa sniffled as he reported.

"Calm down Kisa. We'll find him somehow. I'll get the others to help search as well. You just continue searching around that area and keep me updated."

"Yes boss." With that said, I ended the call and called Hatori and Mino over. Hatori was on the phone, probably with this author, and Mino was just resting in his seat with his head on the table. When I called them over, Hatori said something like 'I'll call you later, no everything is alright' and he hung up. Mino just flopped off the desk and they both walked over to where I was, exhaustion clearly written on their faces.

"Onodera is missing, Kisa just called me and told me that we couldn't find him. We'll split up and search for him in the places that he regularly goes, alright. We need to find him ASAP!" When I finished, their faces were no longer filled with exhaustion, it was replaced with seriousness. Both of them gave me a firm nod and we went our own ways to find him.

As I exited the office, I tried thinking of the places where he could have gone. My first thought was the library that we both go to. I ran towards the library. Even though it was only a short 10 minutes walk from the office to the library, it felt like it took my 30 minutes while running. My lungs were burning and begging for oxygen, well that just shows how unfit I am, but I just continued to run. Onodera is more important. Above me, they sky grumbled and turned a few shades darker, today is seriously not a good day.

Running up the stairs that led to the main entrance of the library, I remembered running into Onodera many times. The very first time was when we both came to return books that we had borrowed and him falling on the stairs. I could still remember how warm he was when I hugged him, trying to prevent him from falling. From that thought, my mind drifted off to the countless times where Onodera was reckless. Like the time he flew all the way to Hokkaido to help Mutou-sensei with her storyboard. I didn't mange to tell him how proud I was. That every first meeting, he had given his data so professionally it shocked me. I was seriously surprised with how professional he can be.

With the main entrance of the library coming into view, my mind immediately picked out my high school days where I would spend the most of the afternoons and evenings with Onodera in the library, helping him with whatever topic he needed help in. At the top step, the beautiful building filled with knowledge and memories came into full view. My eyes darted to the door and noticed there was a white A4 piece of paper pasted on the door. On the white surface, the word CLOSED caught my attention.

'The library is closed so he can't be inside, maybe the area around the library?'

I ran around the area trying to find light brown hair or emerald eyes. Nothing. I didn't even see anyone else around here. The other 2 places that I could think of was our apartment or the office. Considering the state that Onodera is in, he probably won't want to travel so far and he would probably have gone to somewhere nearby like the library or our office, I headed back to the office.

When I was halfway back, my phone rang and I dug it out of my pocket. The caller ID was Mino I quickly picked it up.

"Takano here."

"Takano-san, I found Onodera-kun. I am here with him on the rooftop of the office. He won't respond to whatever I say."

"Got it, I'm coming back now. Just stay with him. Call the others to let them know."

"Oka- ONODERA!" The call was cut.

Mino's loud shout shocked me. Mino, who doesn't really speak, actually shouted. But it didn't sound like he was scolding anyone, I sounded more like a call? When my mind finally registered who Mino shouted; roof, not responding, suicidal thought; my heart sank. Knowing that the roof of our office doesn't have any barricades or protection of any sort, I ran with the worst outcome in mind towards our office.

Along the way, I called Kisa and Hatori to let that know that Onodera had been found and is at the office. When I was done with the calls, I had finally reached the office. Without letting my legs rest, I continued running up via the staircase to the top floor. When I pushed the door to the roof open, my eyes widened in shock and my heart shattered.

Mino POV

Personally, I'm not very close to Onodera-kun but I still cared about him. He had helped me very much when my nephew, Yamato and I were drifting apart. He managed to talk to Yamato and now we are closer than before, all thanks to him. So when I first heard about his suicidal thoughts, I was worried and shocked. Even though I'm not as close as he is to Kisa-san, I still wanted to help him in any way I can.

When I heard that he was missing, my worries only grew. After Takano-san told us the plan, I decided to stay in the office in case he came back. Deciding that I would be better to go down to the first floor where I would be able to see him, I took the lift down. At the first floor, I could see the sky was gloomy. I hoped that no one would get caught in the rain. Just incase, I went to ask the receptionist if they had seen a young male with light brown hair and emerald eyes. She told me that she doesn't remember seeing anyone like that enter. But she did see someone run in and up the stairs. Guessing that it was Onodera-kun, I quickly thanked her and followed his path, hoping to run into him as I began my search for him on every floor.

At every floor, I ran 1 round around the floor and asked the people there if they had seen a young male with light brown hair and emerald eyes. When I reached the 3rd floor, I bumped into Yokozawa-san and asked him the same question that I had been asking everyone. So far everyone had replied 'no sorry' or just a simple 'no', but Yokoazwa-san's reply was much different.

"Onodera? Nope haven't seen him fro- Oi!" After I heard the 'no', I just continued running without listening to whatever else he had to say.

When I reached the 4th floor, where our department was and the highet floor excluding the roof, I had already spent about 5 minutes. I'm grateful that our office is so small in this case as time is something we didn't have. I continued running and asking people but no one saw him. I really hoped that Onodera-kun didn't go the roof as with his brain as fuzzled and mixed up, he might not think rationally.

Since he was no where on the four floors, I took the stairs up to the roof. When I opened the roof door, my eyes scanned the whole roof and I spotted Onodera-kun. It really wasn't hard. The white roof floor contrasted really well to Onodera-kun's light brown hair. He was standing facing the city, back facing me. I took a few steps forward and he didn't seem to register that I was there with him. I decided to call out to him just to let him know that I was here to prevent him from getting a shock later.

"Onodera-kun?"

He didn't respond, he just stood there not moving, facing the city. I gently placed a hand on his shoulder and still seeing that he had no reaction, I gently pulled his shoulder so that he rotated and faced me. I had expected to see those shining sparkly emerald eyes but instead I came face to face with dead dull green eyes. His eyes held no emotions, no feeling, there was nothing there. Even though we were standing face to face, he did not react whatsoever.

Before doing anything else, I decided to let the other know that I found Onodera-kun so that they wouldn't have to search for someone who had already been found. I took one look at Onodera-kun before grabbing my phone from my pocket and dialing Takano-san's number. Having a habit of turning away from people when I talk on the phone, I unconsciously turned around.

After a few rings, Takano-san's deep voice spilled out from my phone.

"Takano here."

"Takano-san, I found Onodera-kun. I am here with him on the rooftop of the office. He won't respond to whatever I say."

"Got it, I'm coming back now. Just stay with him. Call the others to let them know." He sounded really tired and worried.

I was about to acknowledge whatever Takano-san had said when I turned towards Onodera-kun. He was standing much closer to the edge of the roof from when I first found him. But the unsettling part was that he was still walking slowly, closer and closer to the edge. I let my phone slip from my hand and crash onto the roof floor as I ran towards him while yelling his name.

He didn't respond so I just reached out with one hand and grabbed his wrist, was he always this skinny? Once I secured my grip on skinny wrist, I tried to pull him back and away from the edge but he just continued as if I wasn't even there trying to hold him back. Seeing that whatever I was doing was ineffective, I stretched out my other hand and now with 2 hands holding the same wrist, I tried pulling him back. Why was he so strong? Or maybe I am just this weak and exhausted. Overhead, the dark clouds rumbled as I continued my 'tug-of-war' with him.

Suddenly, the roof door burst open. I turned and saw a panting Takano-san emerge. He stood there trying to catch his breath for a few seconds with shocked smeared all over his face. When he had recovered from the shock, he dashed towards us and started pulling Onodera-kun's other hand. With the both of us pulling him at the same time, it seems that Onodera-kun didn't have the strength to fight the both of us. We slowly and steadily pulled him away from the edge. When we were at a somewhat safer distance, we both let go of his slender wrists and slid down to our knees from the exhaustion and running. Onodera-kun also seemed to have lost all the strength in his legs as he fell onto the ground on his knees as well, his back to the roof door.

After catching our breaths, Takano-san looked to where Onodera-kun was.

"Ritsu..." I heard him say as he shuffled towards Onodera-kun and hugged him. Onodera-kun just knelt ther his hands dangling at the side of his body and his dull eyes staring somewhere far away. Seeing this made my heart hurt but I knew that this was much tougher for Takano-san. All of us in that department knew that Takano-san was much kinder and looked out for Onodera-kun than he had for anyone else. The both of them were mostly together so we could kind of guess the relationship they had, but we never mentioned it because they were so cute.

Still at the same position, I looked at them from the corner of my eye and I what I saw made my heart ache. Takano-san was crying. The demon editor was actually crying. He knelt in front of Onodera-kun and hugged him with his head on Onodera-kun's shoulder. From where I was, I could see drops of tears fall out of Takano-san's eyes and onto the floor. The whole time he was mumbling something but I couldn't hear it.

I shuffled closer to the both of them and realised that Takano-san was saying Onodera-kun's name. Onodera-kun's first name. "Ritsu... Ritsu..." He just kept calling him, hoping that his voice would reach him. I saw this and I immediately made my way over to the both of them and hugged Onodera-kun from the back. "Onodera-kun..." I unconsciously called as I embraced the both of them, tearing sliding down my face.

Suddenly, I felt 2 more pairs of hands around us before hearing, "Ricchan..." that was Kisa-san. "Onodera..." that was Hatori-san. We just sat there, all embracing our precious college with tears all in our eyes.


	17. Chapter 17: Safe

Onodera POV

There was nothing. I felt absolutely nothing. I just stared at the city before my eyes, not thinking about anything. From my view, the people walking around looked like ants and vehicles looked like beetles. Even though I wasn't that high up, I felt really close to the sky. The gloomy sky. Somewhere behind me, I heard a door open and some footsteps. I heard someone call out to me, I didn't recognise that voice. Who was it? It doesn't matter. My view of the city slowly swirled and changed as I came face to face with a man with brown hair. Was his eyes closed? I don't know who this is, thus, no need to respond to him.

I saw the man take out his phone, shoot me one glance and turned around to talk on the phone. At this point, my ears had blocked out everything so I couldn't hear what he was talking about of to whom. 'Sigh... even a stranger doesn't want to look to me... but what's new... nobody wants to look at a loser anyway...'. My thoughts ran by themselves and before I realised, my body had started moving by itself. I didn't know what it wanted to do and I didn't care. Seeing the same city view again, I realised that my body was taking me closer and closer to the edge. Realising what it really wanted to do, one part of me didn't care while the other part was somewhat scared.

I unconsciously wanted to die.

One part of me didn't care, all the things that people have said to me the past few days were just so hurtful. I never ever want to feel that again. Jumping would definitely ensure that I'd never have to feel that again. It was a good thing. But, somewhere in the back of my mind I was scared. I was scared to jump. I was scared to lose everything that I had worked so hard for. I was scared that I would leave this world without accomplishing anything. I was scared of losing Takano-san again. I was scared- 'Wait... Takano-san?..'

Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. Live. Die. LIVE.

Despite everything, I really wanted to live. I wanted to stay alive, accomplish everything I wanted to do. I want to figure out my feelings towards Takano-san. I mentally yelled for my body to stop but it didn't listen.

'Please... let me live... someone help me... I don't want to die!'

At that moment, I felt a pair of hands grab my wrist. That person was trying to pull me back! However, my body still continued to move forward, as if nothing was holding it back. I could see the edge coming closer and closer.

'Someone save me! Someone help me! Help me, TAKANO-SAN!'

At that moment, another pair of hands grabbed my other wrist. I recognised that touch. It was Takano-san! The countless times of his ruffling my hair or holding my hands subconsciously made me remember his touch. With 2 pairs of hands pulling me back, my body was unable to move forward so it moved backwards towards the 2 pairs of hands.

When we were at a safer distance, the 2 pairs of hands let go of me. In that short time, I had managed to get my body under control. Feeling no strength in my legs, I slumped down on my knees and just knelt there, not wanting to move. From the corner of my eye, I could see a black haired man shuffling closer to me. Strange, he looks so familiar, who is he? Without warning, that man pulled me into a hug, his head resting on my shoulder.. I've never felt such warmth before. It was nice and comforting.

Drip drip

First I heard that man saying my name, my first name. He just kept repeating it. The, I felt something wet land on my shoulder that the man was resting on. It's not raining, so what was it? Tears? Why was this man crying? Shortly afterwards I heard someone call my name 'Onodera-kun...' and someone hugging me. Why is there someone else hugging me?

'Ricchan...' 'Onodera...' 2 more people called out my name and 2 more people joined the hug. I continued kneeling there, not moving, letting these 4 strangers hug me. It was so warm. Sadly, when the first man released me from his embrace, the other 3 followed and they all moved to where that man was kneeling. The first thing I noticed about the 4 of then was that they were really handsome, especially the taller black haired one. The second thing I noticed was that they were all crying.

"Why... why are you crying.. " I muttered as I continued staring at them.

"Ricchan... we almost lost you! Of course we were scared to lose you! Don't do that again... please... don't make us worry..." The shortest man bawled as he said.

"Why... why do you worry about me..."

"We care about you. You are like family. Of course we will worry." This time, the first man that saw me sobbed.

"Family?.. We are family?..."

"Yes Onodera. We are all family." The taller man with brown hair said while trying to smile.

"Who... who are you..."

My gaze unconsciously shifted to the taller man with black hair. He hasn't said anything yet. Our eyes met and I saw sadness in it before he moved forward. He pulled both my hands out and held them while calling me by my first name. The others all followed suit and copied what he did. I slowly shifted my view, taking my time to look at each one of them. They all had sadness in their eyes, sad that I didn't remember them. When my eyes met the shortest male's eyes, he called me, 'Ricchan'. Wait... there's only one person who calls me that.

"Kisa-san?" I saw his eyes widen and come to life when I said that. "Ricchan!" He smiled so purely and brightly as his said that, he let go my hands.

My gaze shifted over to the first man I saw. 'Onodera-kun'. I still don't remember him. Seeing that I could not remember, he sadly smiled. Wait... I only know of someone who has that smile.

"Mino-san?" For the first time, his eyes opened and I saw beautiful brown eyes staring back at me. "Onodera-kun!" His signature smile was back, he let go of my hands..

The next man was the taller one with brown hair. 'Onodera.' I don't remember him. I saw him move his hand to touch my bandage. Strange, why was there a bandage? When he gently closed his hand, I remembered someone putting that bandage for me.

"Hatori-san?" His face remained the same, just that now there was a bright smile on this face. "Onodera." He let go of my hands.

Now it was the last man. 'Ritsu'. He seriously sounds and looks familiar, and I can't get rid of the feeling that he is someone really important to me. He dejectedly looked down and moved even closer to me. Then, one of his hands made its way up to my head where he rested it on the back of my head, while his other hand intertwined with my fingers. This touch... I know this touch.

"Takano-san?" Said man immediately looked up and stared at my face. I could see tears forming in his beautiful hazel eyes. When he closed his eyes and pulled into a smile, the tears flowed down his face. "Ritsu." He said as he pulled me into a tight hug.

"Kisa-san... Mino-san... Hatori-san... Takano-san..." I said as I slowly shifted my gaze between the 4 of them. All of them smiled back at me except Takano-san who was still hugging me. With Takano-san so close to me, I could smell him. He smelled like cigarettes, sweat and Takano-san. Feeling all the warmth and care inside plus seeing their tear stained face, I could feel the tears forming in my eyes. Unlike just now, the rest did not join in the hug, they just stayed there looking at us.

All the warmth, care and concern I felt from all my colleges made a crack in the wall that I had built. Takano-san's warmth, touch, voice, everything give it the final blow. I felt a few drops of water hitting me but I didn't want to move. I couldn't hold back anymore and I needed to release everything.

"Masamune..." I muttered as I returned the hug and buried my face into Takano-san's chest. When I felt Takano-san tightening his hug, the tears fell off my face and I just sat there hugging Takano-san and crying into his chest. I felt his hand return to the back of my head as he just stroked my hair, comforting me. I didn't know what all this feeling was, it was painful, mushy and comforting. It was just weird. Come to think of it, this was the first time I had cried in my whole life. My parents were really strict, especially my mother. She didn't let me cry, didn't let me express myself and didn't allow me to make friends, thus making me study at home with a home tutor. Everything changed when my father sent me to school and I met Saga-senpai.

Saga-senpai was the one who lit up my life and introduced color, joy and love to my dull life. He was the one that saved me back then. Even now, even if he changed names, changed the way he acted, he was still the Saga-senpai, no he is the Masamune Takano that I fell in love back then and now.

Masamune Takano is the love of my life.

With this new found knowledge, my heart fluttered as I continued crying into Masamune's chest until I ran out of tears. When I was done, I remained in the position for a few seconds before Masamune released his hug and shifted my face to look up at him. His hair and face was wet from the rain but he still looked beautiful. I peeked behind him to see that my other colleges had left us alone up on the roof. Noticing that we were alone, Masamune turned my face back to face him and he planted a soft gentle kiss on my forehead.

It was just a simple touch. A simple peck. A simple kiss. But that simple action spread even more warmth through me and I hugged him back, tighter than before. Despite the rain falling like nobody's business, we didn't move from our position. Masamune had returned the hug and we just sat there in silence, in each others embrace.

After a while, we released each other and just stared into each others eyes both soaked to the skin.

"Ritsu. I love you. So please don't say that nobody needs you and that you're worthless. I need you so please don't ever leave me again."

"Masamune... I love you too. But... I still can't get rid of that feeling of hopelessness and uselessness."

"Ritsu... It's though but I'll help you get through his period. I won't let anyone hurt you. I promise. Will you let me help you?"

I nodded slowly, still unsure.

"Ritsu..." He kissed my forehead again. "Should we go down? The rain is starting to fall heavier. Can you stand?"

I nodded and tried to stand to no avail. Masamune extended his hand to help me up but even with his offered support, I still couldn't muster any strength in my legs. Seeing this, Masamune offered to piggy-back me down to our department. I tried to reject his offer as I didn't want others to think that Masamune is willing to stoop down to my level but he obviously ignored me.

"Ritsu, I'm going to carry you down no matter what style. Would you rather me piggy-back you down or do you want me to carry you bridal style."

Thinking of Masamune carrying me bridal style made me blush and I instantly crawled to where Masamune was bending and onto his back. On the way down, i could feel people's eyes staring at us as we walked from the staircase to our department. I didn't like people staring at me so I buried my face into Masamune's back. When I did that, I could feel his grip on my leg tight slightly, assuring me that everything was alright.

Feeling the warmth from Masamune's back and hands, I closed my eyes and thanked the heavens that I was still here with my lover.


	18. Chapter 18: Starting to get better

When we were back at our department, Masamune gently sat me down on my seat before walking over to his own. Kisa-san and Mino-san were sitting in their sits as if waiting for us to come back. Seeing that I was seated, Hatori-san got up and walked out of our department.

"Where's Hatori going?" Masamune asked.

"To get the President, he said he wanted to tell us something." Kisa-san said before turning his gaze to me. "Ricchan are you cold?" I shook my head. Kisa-san smiled and hummed in acknowledgement. At that moment, Hatori-san came back with the President infront of him. As Hatori-san was walking back to his seat, Isaka-san scanned our department. The whole time I didn't dare to look up at him. When he saw that both Masamune and I were soaked to the skin, he burst out in laughter. Before he could carry on, Masamune coughed to get Isaka-san's attention. Isaka-san cleared his throat and began.

"Hey Emerald department, these 2 weeks or so must have been hard for all of you. With various sales programs ongoing while having your magazine deadline pushed forward, it must have been tough. Well, congratulations on making it through! As a reward, you guys can take the rest of the week off and come back the next Monday, rest well!" Today is a Wednesday which means that we had 4 days of break! Wow!

"Oh yes one more thing, regarding the release of the results, it will be on Saturday. We will mail it to Takano and afterwards Takano will forward it to all of you. Speaking of results, Onodera-kun, Yokozawa has the updated results for Mutou-sensei's sales. If there's nothing else from me or Takano?" He shook his head. "You are all free to go home."

"Onodera, can you wait for me for a while?" Masamune asked as he got up from his seat and walked to where Isaka-san was. After giving him a nod, he continued. "Isaka-san, can I discuss the next magazine's plan with you?"

"Sure. Let's go to a meeting room." After both of them left, Kisa-san and Mino-san left after saying goodbye to me. Hatori-san picked up his to call someone but he didn't look like he was going to move. So with nothing to do, I leaned onto my desk. My eyelids felt like weights and before I knew it, my eyes were closed and I had drifted off to sleep.

In the meeting room

"So Takano, what are your plans for the next magazine? I can't believe you came up with a plan so quickly even with all the weird things going on."

"I haven't thought about it yet."

"Heh? Didn't you say that you had something to discuss with me? About the magazine plan?"

"Sorry. That was a lie. What I really wanted to discuss is Onodera."

"Onodera-kun? Oh right, there was a bandage on this wrist. What happened?"

"Earlier, he used a penknife to cut himself."

"What?!"

"That's not all. He tried to commit suicide too. Twice."

"WHAT?! WHAT HAPPENED?"

"I'm not sure but I have my assumptions from what I heard so far. He keeps calling himself useless and hopeless and that he just causes more work for people. From all this, I'm guessing that some people in this office are talking badly about his work but he overheard them. And for that to make such a huge impact, it must have happened countless of times already."

"I can't believe this... Does his family know about this?"

"That's another thing he mentioned. Earlier, he said that he has no family. I'm not sure what he meant by that but he had been on the phone with someone these past weeks and that person always seemed to scold him."

"Hmm. Let's try to settle this before he comes back to work on Monday."

"Agreed. I'm bringing him to a doctor later and I'll take care of him over the next few days since he's my neighbour."

"Ok, I'll try to figure out what happened on his family side and let you know. Keep me updated."

"Of course."

Onodera POV

I was standing at the entrance of the library where I often visit to rent books. There was a note on the glass door. 'Scheduled for demolition.' Why this library? As I just stood there in shock, I heard someone call my name and I turned around. I saw Masamune standing at the top of the stairs, his bangs hiding his eyes. Just when I was about to call out to him, we turned out and started walking down the steps. I ran forward, trying to stop him from leaving but no matter how much I stretched and ran, I just couldn't touch him. My fingertips were a mere millimeter away from his jacket. I tried once more to grab him but he fell. His body rolled down the stairs until it came to a stop at a flat portion of the staircase.

Blood. There was a lot of blood. Blood was forming around Masamune's head where he just lay there motionless, this eyes sill hidden by his bangs. I ran down and called out to him, begging him to open his eyes and say that it was just a joke. But it never happened. I held him close to my chest and silently sobbed. From the corner of my eye, I saw a few pairs of shoes approach me. I looked up and saw my mother and Yokozawa-san.

"HOW MANY TIMES MUST I TELL YOU TO LEAVE MASAMUNE ALONE? All you do it hurt him! Just like what you did!"

"Masamune..." I whispered.

"Do NOT call him that. You don't deserve to call him that. You who can't even get your work done properly has no reason or rights to address Masamune by his first name!"

"I agree with his Ritsu! This is what happens when you don't listen to me and do everything so half-assed. You do everything so half-assed that you can't even do simple things in your office. What a let down. That's why you have no rights to be part of the Onodera family. All you do is tarnish our family's name, cause more problems for other people."

"You are a burden."

"Dead-weight."

I didn't want to hear anymore so I covered my ears with my hands while looking down at Takano-san. His head suddenly turned as faced me. 'Useless.' When I saw him mouth that, I could feel fresh tears streaming down my face as I pressed my palms into my ears to block out everything.

"-dera! Onodera! ONODERA!" Is that Isaka-san's voice?

My eyes shot open and I realised that I was still lying on the table with tears still flowing out of my eyes. I immediately swiped the tears away and came face to face with Hatori-san, Takano-san and Isaka-san, all of them had worry plastered onto their faces.

Takano-san touched my cheeks with his hands and looked into my eyes. "Ritsu..."

"Takano-san? I'm sorry! I will work even harder so that I won't be a burden or a dead-weight! Please let me stay! I'll prove to you that I am beneficial to the team! Please don't let me go... Please don't leave me alone... Don't call me useless..." Fresh hot tears poured out of my eyes as I pleaded.

Suddenly, I was pulled into a hug. It was Takano-san hugging me.

"Ritsu. I would NEVER let you go and NEVER leave you alone. You are important to our team and to me. And you are not useless or a dead-weight or a burden, you are essential to our team. There's no one who can ever replace you. EVER."

I turned to see Hatori-san and Isaka-san nodding their heads in agreement. I returned the hug and let my tears run out, which didn't take long, before turning to Isaka-san.

"Sorry Isaka-san, did you want to tell me something?"

"Huh no. Why?"

"You were calling my name?"

"Ahh. That was because Hatori noticed you crying in your sleep and he tried to wake you up but you didn't. So he came to look for Takano and I just happened to be with him. When I saw that you weren't reacting to Takano's voice, I decided to give it a shot. Anyways, are you alright?"

"Oh... yes. Thank you and sorry Hatori-san."

"It's okay, I'm going to go now. Bye Takano-san, Isaka-san, Onodera, call me if anything happens."

I nodded and he left. When Takano-san finally released me from the hug, we both packed our bags and left. As we were walking to the train station, Takano-san always stayed beside me.

"Onodera. Do you have anything planned after this?" I shook my head. "Ok, can you follow me? I need to drop by somewhere." I nodded and followed Takano-san.

When he told me that we reached, I didn't expect it to be a clinic. I thought that he was going to bring me to the library.

"Um Takano-san... are you sick?"

"No. It's for you."

"Me? But I'm not sick."

"Just follow me."

Without any other arguments, I just followed Takano-san into the clinic. After collecting a number, we went to the seats and waited for our turn. While waiting, my eyes drifted to a TV in the waiting room. It was playing some cartoon that I've never seen before. Even though I'm not interested in cartoons, there was nothing else to do there so I just watched the show.

After a while, it was our turn to see the doctor, so we walked over to the room. Knocking 3 times and receiving a 'Come in', we walked into the room. The room smelt of antiseptic and medicine but I just ignored it.

"Hi how may I help you?" The doctor asked us.

"Hi doc, he might have depression so could you do some tests for him?" Takano-san answered.

"Sure. What is your relation to him?"

"I'm his boss."

"Ok." He turned to me. "Onodera-kun, I'll ask you some questions so just answer them honestly." I flinched when he called me by my family but I snapped out of his shortly afterwards and nodded.

'Do you have a loss of appetite?' Yes.

'Do you feel like vomiting after eating?' Most of the time.

'Do you have problems sleeping?' Yes.

'Do you have aches or pain that just won't go away?' Yes, headache.

'Do you feel hopeless? Like this will never work out?' Yes.

'Do you feel guilty about anything?' Yes.

'Who do you live with?' Alone.

After scribbling something down on his clipboard, he turned to look at my bandaged hand and asked Takano-san what happened.

"My colleges found him cutting himself with a penknife but when we asked him about it he didn't realise that he was doing it to himself."

"Is that true Onodera-kun?" I flinched at that name but just nodded my head. I saw the doctor pause and think for a while before continuing.

"Onodera-kun." I flinched. "Ritsu-kun." I didn't flinch and he continued. "Can I just check your wound? In case it needs to be redressed." I nodded.

When everything was done. The doctor turned to Takano-san and asked him one final question. 'Did he have any suicidal attempts? If yes how many. Also, did he seem to have a loss of memory when he snapped out of it?' "Yes. 2. Yes." He scribbled on his clipboard and stared at the information he received and looked at the both of us.

"Ritsu-kun, you have depression. Can I have a family member's contact? We need to inform them of this as depression is very dangerous, he cannot live by himself."

"Doctor, his family is currently overseas right now. I can look after him, he is my neighbor."

"Ritsu-kun are you alright with that?" I just nodded my head. "Okay. Takano-san, if his condition worsens please bring him to a hospital."

"Thank you doctor." With all that said, we got up and left. Surprisingly, I wasn't shocked or worried when he doctor told me that I had depression, it was more like I didn't care.

As we were walking to our building from the train station, Takano-san asked me, "Ritsu, the doctor said that it would be dangerous if you stayed by yourself so we'll stay together? Alright." I just nodded. "Whose apartment do you want to stay at? Mine or yours?" "Takano-san's." "Alright, later we'll drop by your apartment so you can get your stuff."

This marks the start of me living with Takano-san.


	19. Truth about to be unfolded

That night, we dropped by my apartment to collect some of my things to bring over to Takano-san's place. All I really needed was a change of clothes and my toothbrush. With everything taken, I stalked next door. Seeing that the door was left ajar, I cautiously pushed it open only to be met with a really nice aroma, curry. The strong smell of spices and steamed rice smelt like heaven as I walked closer and closer to the source. With my clothes and things in my hands, I approached the kitchen and when I stuck my head into the kitchen, I saw Takano-san shirtless. His wet shirt was deposited on a nearby chair but he still had his pants on. The scene that made my jaw fall was a shirtless Takano-san wearing a plain navy blue apron with one hand on his hips and the other stirring a pot of curry.

I unconsciously walked forward to where Takano-san stood stoically and peeked from behind him to see what kind of curry he was making. I saw chopped onions, spices, potatoes, carrots and chicken meat. He was probably making chicken curry, my favorite. Noticing that I was behind him, Takano-san turned around and asked if I wanted to help him. With nothing else to do, I agreed and placed my items down on his couch before going back to the kitchen to retrieve all the necessary utensils. With all the cutlery ready, I went over to the rice cooker and scooped out half a plate of rice on one plate and a quarter of a plate of rice onto another. I placed the plates of rice next to the pot of curry where Takano-san was and stood behind him to give him space. Without glancing to the side, he reached out and grabbed the first plate of rice. From where I was standing, I could see his biceps clearly stretching as he lifted the ladle to scoop curry onto the plate.

When he was about to finish pouring the curry onto the first plate, I walked out and stood beside him waiting to collect the plate from him. The whole time, since I stepped into his apartment, we did not talk much, it was a comfortable silence. But that silence was broken when he stretched out to take the other plate of rice. Just as he was about to pour curry onto the plate, he paused. He just stood there not moving for a good 4 seconds staring at the rice on the second plate. When he finally snapped out of the little trance he was in, he turned to face me and asked me.

"Who's is this?"

"Mine."

"You're eating so little rice?"

I nodded. "I'm not that hungry."

"Hmm..." He hummed and continued looking into my eyes as if trying to see if I was lying.

Confirming that I wasn't lying about me being not hungry, he turned his attention back to the pot of curry and scooped out some curry onto the plate. When that was done, he passed me the plate and walked to the fridge. I took both plates with 2 spoons and walked out to the living room. When I placed both plates on the table, I sat down and waited for Takano-san to come back. After a while, Takano-san emerged from the kitchen without his apron while holding a carton of beer in one hand. Putting the carton of beer on the table, he walked into his room and grabbed a new shirt before sitting down opposite me. I stared at the beer, the curry and finally at him, confusion clearly spelled on my face.

"Hmm? What's wrong? Is there something on my face?"

"No... Why the beer and the chicken curry?"

"Oh...It is to congratulate you for enduring and pushing through this horrible period. It was tough but you still did well, so congratulations and thank you."

"Thank you? Why are you thanking me? I didn't do any that is worth your thanks."

"You are here beside me and you are constantly supporting and encouraging me without you yourself knowing. So thank you for being there for ma all the time. Ritsu."

At this point, his hand reach out and gently cupped my cheek, making me look up into his eyes. His beautiful hazel eyes that were filled with some kind of emotion. Some kind of love. His eyes were filled with love. Love for me...

I unconsciously lifted my hand and placed it under his, pressing it gently against my cheek as I leaned into the touch. "Thank you too." I whispered as I closed my eyes and slowly leaned into the warm from his hand. It was so soothing, so relaxing, so refreshing, so wonderful. I opened my eyes to see Takano-san looking straight into my eyes while smiling brightly like a child when he received candy.

After parting from our contact, we ate our dinner in peace, neither of us touching the beer as of yet. The warm thick gravy filled me with warmth from the inside of my stomach all the way to my face as I ate small mouthfuls of the delicious curry. As excepted, even though the food was divine, I didn't have the appetite to finish everything. When I was halfway through my plate, I was already filling full so I put down my utensils. I looked up and saw Takano-san looking at me worriedly.

I saw him open his mouth, as if wanting to say something. Just as he was about to speak, a loud knock resonated from Takano-san's door. He sighed loudly and walked over to the door. When he opened it, Yokozawa-san came into full view.

"Oi Masamune. This is the update for Mutou-sensei's sales. Pass them on to Onodera for me." Hearing my family name from afar still made me finch unconsciously despite it being soft.

Suddenly without warning, Yokozawa-san swung the door open and stepped into Takano-san house. When he saw me sitting at the dinning table, he immediately frowned and asked Takano-san.

"What is he doing here?"

"As you can see we were having dinner together until you came." I looked down onto my lap, not wanting to look at anyone.

"I told you to stop disturbing Masamune! How many times do you need me to tell you that you are only hurting him! Idiot!"

Those words were addressed to me. The second he said the word 'idiot' I could feel my stomach churning and felt nauseous. I covered my mouth with my hands and ran to the toilet before releasing everything I ate into the toilet bowl. After a few seconds, I had run out of food to throw out so bile came out. I was so busy hacking into the toilet bowl that I didn't even notice that Takano-san had entered and was rubbing my back in an upwards motion, helping me.

When I was done, I stayed kneeling next to the toilet bowl with my hands holding it for support. I breathed heavily and tried to the calm down. The acidic taste was still there so I tried to stand up and wash the taste off my mouth. I pushed against the toilet bowl trying to stand but failing. Before I could hit the tiled toilet floor, I felt a pair of hands supporting my arm. Those strong hands pulled me onto my feet and led me to the sink to wash off the disgusting aftertaste. The coolness of the water felt like heaven as it cleansed my mouth off that retched taste.

"Sorry... I didn't mean to waste your food..."

"It's alright, don't worry about that. How are you feeling?" Takano-san's deep voice echoed off the toilet walls.

"Dizzy."

Without any other words, Takano-san supported and led me out of the toilet to the couch where he pushed me down gently. When he was done, he turned to face Yokozawa-san who was still standing at the same spot, too shocked to move.

"Yokozawa. I told you just now to stop talking to him this way. It's hurting him! Can't you just talk to him normally?" His hands were clenched into fists.

"Huh. What are you talking about? I always talk to him this way. I'm only saying all of this to protect you, Masamune. Surely you didn't forget what happened to you 11 years ago when you had your heart torn apart?"

"I remember. But that wasn't his fault. It was a simple miscommunication that we had already cleared up."

"Whatever. I was there trying to pull you back onto your own 2 feet all because this guy messed with your life. You would be so much better off without someone who just causes problems."

From where I was sitting, I couldn't see Takano-san's face as his back was facing me but I knew that he was beyond pissed. His hands were clenched so tightly that they were shaking.

"YOKOZAWA! RITSU IS MY LOVER! STOP TALKING ABOUT HIM THAT WAY! YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT HIM! HE DIDN'T CAUSE ANY PROBLEMS FOR ANYONE!" Takano-san shouted.

"HUH? YOU ALWAYS HAVE TO BACK HIM UP BECAUSE HE CAN'T EVEN DO HIS OWN THINGS PROPERLY! HE'S JUST MAKING YOU DO MORE WORK! WE DON'T NEED SOMEONE AS USELESS AS HIM IN OUR OFFICE!"

All the shouting made my head ache and before I knew it, I was covering my ears with my hands and holding my head. The throbbing had returned and was wreaking my head from the inside out.

"Ugh..." The pain was mortifying and I couldn't control myself as a groan escaped my lips. Suddenly, the room was silent so I gazed upwards to see Takano-san looking at me, worried pasted on his face. I immediately turned my gaze away and looked somewhere else. Takano-san turned his gaze back to Yokozawa.

"Get out."

"Huh?"

"Get. Out." Takano-san said a tad bit louder.

"Fine." Yokozawa-san turned and slammed the door after him.

The sounds were so loud and painful. I pressed my hands harder to my ears, trying to block out as much as I could. With Yokozawa-san gone, Takano-san turned back to me and softly apologised.

"Sorry for that Ritsu. Do you think you can eat anything?" I shook my head. "Hold on." Takano-san said as he went into the kitchen.

A while later, he re-entered with a sports drink in his hand. He asked me to try and drink it as it would at least fill my stomach with some sugar. I cautiously took the drink from his hand and studied it for a while. Feeling unsure, I looked back to Takano-san and when he gave me a nod, I sipped some of the drink. It tasted sweet, really sweet. But it was cooling for my throat so I just continued sipping slowly.

Takano-san still stood there making sure that I wasn't going to puke anytime soon and just watching me. When he felt that things were alright, he walked back to the dinning table and returned with his plate of curry rice. He sat down next to me on the couch and silently ate his food after turning on the TV. After a few bites, his phone rang so he got up to answer it. Feeling slightly curious, my eyes followed him as he walked to his phone and picked up the call.

"Takano here."

"Isaka here."

"Isaka-san, why are you calling me at this hour?"

"It's regarding Onodera-kun's family. Is he with you?" Takano-san turned to look at me, I just stared at him, my gaze unwavering.

"Yeah he is. Do you want to talk to him?"

"If its possible."

"Hold on." Takano-san walked over to me and passed the phone to me saying that it was from Isaka-san.

"Hello Isaka-san, Ritsu here."

"Hello Ono- Ritsu. I'm about to discuss something important with you." He paused for a while taking in a breath. "It's regarding your family."

I swallowed and asked him to continue. "From what I understand, you are currently staying with Takano for a while?"

"Yeah."

"Then would it be alright if he joined our conversation? So that he can better help you."

"Sure."

I passed the phone back to Takano-san. After Takano-san exchanged a few more words with Isaka-san, he placed the phone on speaker.

"Alright, let's begin."


	20. Chapter 20: The truth

"Alright let's begin. If you are both alright, can I add one more person to this call? He will be able to help out."

Takano-san turned to me looking for some sort of conformation from me. I nodded and Takano-san told Isaka-san that we were both fine with it while sitting down beside me.

"Hello, can everybody hear me?" That voice... I knew that voice...

"Yes we can hear you. May I ask who are you?" Takano-san said.

"Fa...father...?" My voice came out so soft that I was surprised that he heard me.

"Ritsu? Ritsu is that you? Thank goodness you are alright. I heard the gist of things from Isaka-san."

Takano-san turned to me but I just continued staring that the phone screen that showed Isaka-san's caller ID, too shocked to say anything.

"Ritsu? Are you still there?" It was Isaka-san's voice.

I could feel someone gently tapping my shoulder. I turned to the source to see Takano-san looking at me, no emotions written on his face. Staring at his face for a few seconds, I suddenly snapped out of my shock and replied. "Yes, sorry."

"It's ok Ritsu. Takano-san, I heard from Isaka that you Ritsu's boss and his neighbor and that you volunteered to take care of my son?" My father asked Takano-san.

"Yes."

"I thank you in advance. Now there's something I want to ask you, Ritsu. Did you mother call you or message you recently?" I swallowed and told him that my mother had been calling me.

"Can you tell me what exactly did your mother say to you? She's not with me now, everything you say will be only be heard by the 3 of us in this call."

I didn't want to say it. I didn't want to relive and hear or say those hurtful words again. But I knew that I had to. So I took in a deep breath and started telling them everything.

"She told me that I was a disgrace and that I tarnished the Ono... the family name. I don't have the right to be a part of the family. I've been disowned and I don't have a family anymore." The whole time, nobody said anything and they just listened attentively. When I reached the part where I told them that I didn't have the right to be part of the family, I could feel tears forming in my eyes. Seeing this, Takano-san grabbed my hand and held onto it, giving a slight squeeze frequently. By the time I was done, the tears that threatened to fall had long fallen and were streaming down my face slowly.

"Ritsu... I'm... I;m so sorry to hear that." Takano-san was hugging me and trying to comfort me in anyway he could. The warmth and love I felt from Takano-san only made the tears fall harder and faster. Takano-san was my only form of support who consistently showered me with love and warmth. I hugged him back and just let the tears run out.

When I was done, we released each other and an awkward silence hung in the air.

"Ritsu. Hear me out carefully understood?"

"Yes father."

"No matter what happens, what you do or what you didn't do, you are my son. You are my only son and I will forever love you. And I will never EVER disown you. You will forever be Onodera Ritsu, my son you understand? I agree that your mother was really unreasonable this time but do believe me that she loves you. I will go and talk to her about this, don't worry about anything. You have a long and wide future ahead of you so promise me. Promise me that you will never give up your life for anything, no matter what happens."

"Father... I promise." I sniffed. My father cares about me. He loves me. Is that what I really feels like to be loved by a family member?

"Good boy. Takano-san, do get my number either from Ritsu or Isaka and update me occasionally. I leave him in your hands."

"Yes sir."

"Ritsu. Remember what you promised me alright?" HONK "I've got to go now, take care Ritsu. I love you." And he hung up.

"Ritsu-kun. I'm sorry for that time in the meeting room where I was comparing your project to your older ones. That wasn't very professional and thoughtful of me. I apologise. As for Yokozawa and the others, I will find out who the others are and tell them off. For Yokozawa, I will call him tomorrow. Tonight, just get a good nights rest and don't think about anything related to work, just rest. This week has been hard on the both of you and you both need your well deserved rest. Takano, take care of him."

"Umm Isaka-san, can I ask something?"

"Sure Ristu."

"Where was my father when you called him?"

"He was heading to the airport for a business trip."

"Oh I see. Thank you."

"No problem. Take care the both of you." With that, he hang up.

I leaned back onto the couch and let out a breath that I had been holding. I saw Takano-san stand up, end the call and head to the kitchen to take something. After a short while, he returned with a cup of coffee and sat back down beside me, passing the energy drink to me. "Ritsu. I'm so so sorry."

"Hmm? What for?"

"I'm your boss and I didn't even realise that you were suffering. Instead, I kept on adding work to your work load. I'm so sorry. I should've noticed this kind of things. Please forgive me."

"Takano-san... It's not your fault, you were just doing your job as a boss. I don't blame you or anything. If anything, I should be thanking you."

"Thanking me? What did I even do?"

"You were always there for me, showering me with love and support. You always gave me tips and helped in whatever way you could. Even when I was so close to jumping, my heart didn't want to but I couldn't control my body. I couldn't even call for someone to help me. But you always come without fail to help me no matter what situation it was." I said while holding my hand with my bandage, remembering all the times Takano-san had saved me.

Out of nowhere, Takano-san grabbed the drink from my hands and placed it on the coffee table before pulling me into a tight hug. I heard him whispering into my ear. "Thank you Ritsu. Thank you so much for being here with me. You are the one who saved me. Thank you Ritsu. Thank you."

I returned the hug and closed my eyes, letting Takano-san's smell envelope me. The familiar smell of coffee and cigarettes was just so comforting and so warm. Just as I was about to fall asleep, he released the hug and passed the drink back to me.

"Drink up. You need to have some food or drink in your system before you sleep. Even if it's just some sugar, it would help alot."

I nodded and took the drink from his hand and slowly drank it, letting the cool liquid slide down my throat. Seeing the empty bottle in my hand, Takano-san took it from me and threw it into the bin. I looked over to the clock and saw that it was already 10.30pm. When Takano-san returned, I asked him if it was alright for me to sleep earlier. He gave me the ok and I walked over to the toilet to brush my teeth.

When I opened the toilet door, I saw Takano-san standing outside holding a set of clothes.

"Change into this, it's more comfortable."

"Thank you." I accepted the clothes and went back into the toilet to change. When I was done, I looked at myself in the mirror and saw that I was wearing Takano-san's clothes. They were sightly bigger than me but were super comfortable just like what Takano-san said.

I reopened the toilet door and went out to see Takano-san also in his sleep wear waiting for me on the couch. I don't remember him washing up but maybe his did that when I was in the toilet. Seeing that I was out of the toilet, Takano-san guided me to his bedroom and onto his bed. When I was nicely tucked in, he turned around and was about to leave.

"Takano-san, where are you going?"

"I'm going to sleep on the couch."

"Oh..." I was disappointed, I wanted to sleep with him.

"Do you need anything?"

"No... But, can... can you sleep with me?"

Shock. That word was scribbled all over his face. I was pretty sure that he never expected me to ever ask to sleep with him so it caught him off guard. When he recovered, he asked. "Sleep with you? Are you sure?"

Feeling super embarrassed, I buried my face under the blanket and nodded me head. I could hear him chuckle as he walked closer to the bed. I shifted inwards so that he would have space and faced the other direction. He lifted the blanket slightly and shuffled onto the bed. I could feel him hugging my back, it was so warm. I turned around and snuggled against his chest and he pulled me closer.

Before I knew it, I had already slipped into the land of dreams, hugging the one I care dearly, not wanting to let go.


	21. Chapter 21: True feelings

A flower field. I looked around me and everything was just colorful, vibrant and bright. It was so peaceful and scenic. I liked this place. I stretched out my arms and a soft gentle gust of wind caressed me as I took in a deep breath of the crisp air. With my eyes closed, I slowly leaned back until my back hit the soft ground. When I opened my eyes, I saw canvas of a beautiful blue dotted with patches of white.

I don't ever want to leave this place.

"Ritsu"

Hearing my name, I turned my head to the direction of the sound. On my left, I saw Takano-san lying down beside me, looking back at me. Our hands were intertwined and shortly later, he pulled me into a hug. I nuzzled closer to his chest and closed my eyes.

"Why are you always defending him!"

Takano-san and I immediately sat up and what I saw was my mother and father in a heated argument. Takano-san was still holing my hand. The first shout was from my mother.

"Why are you always so harsh on him! He is our son for goodness sake! Can't you treat him more like a human? Not allowing him to go to school, not allowing him to make friends, not allowing him to cry, Ritsu is a living human and you aren't treating him like one!" Father...

"I'm doing this for the sake of your company! The way he currently is right now, he will just make your company crumble. Don't you want him to take over and make the company successful?"

"Of course I do! But I also respect his decision! Ritsu should live his life the way he wants, neither of us should make his life decisions for him. I want him to do whatever he wants! But you are not respecting him!"

"See! You are defending him again! I can't believe it! I'm doing everything for the company but you and your son are not appreciative at all! Instead the both of you are against everything I do! I can't deal with it anymore!"

"Then don't! Nobody asked you to take charge of everything and ruin everything!"

They both turned around, back facing each other and started walking in the opposite direction.

"Father... mother... don't go, don't fight... I don't want our family to fall apart..."

I felt Takano-san let go of my hand. I looked up to see him walking away from me as well. I called for him to come back but he didn't even turn when I called him. I felt the tears threatening to fall as all the flowers around me withered. The sky was no longer blue, it was a dark grey. The tears fell as I continued to call out for my parents and Takano-san to come back but they just continued walking away, leaving me alone.

I'm alone again.

"...itsu... Ritsu..."

Someone was calling me but I didn't want to look up, I didn't want to see that I was all alone. Now I felt someone shaking me. So persistent. I decided to open my eyes to see who it was...

I slowly opened my eyes and came face to face with Takano-san. His hair was messy, he wasn't wearing his glasses and he was holding my face. His fingers glazed my cheeks as he cleaned something wet off my face. Tears. I was crying. Everything was just a dream. I looked into Takano-san's eyes and saw worry laced in them. I unconsciously shot forward and pulled him into a hug while burying my face in his chest. Feeling arms around me, I leaned in further and let all the tears out.

When I was done, we released each other and I used my hands to wipe the tears off my face.

"Takano-san. Please don't leave me..."

"Ristu... I promise I will never leave you. Were you crying because of that?"

I nodded. "I had a dream where my family fell apart and they left me alone. And after that, you also left me alone..."

"Oh Ritsu..." He hugged me again. "it's alright, it was just a dream. I promise that I will never leave you and I'm sure your parents wouldn't leave you as well."

"Hmm" I hummed and returned the hug. After a while, we released and Takano-san got out of bed to make breakfast for the both of us. I rolled over to the side table where my phone was charging. Takano-san must have helped me plug it in last night, how sweet. I smiled and unplugged my phone a before plugging his in. When I turned on my phone, the first thing I saw was a voice message from my mother. It said:

'Good morning Ritsu. Last night I received a call from your father and he told me everything. Firstly, I would like to apologise to you for being so harsh on you especially the past few days. I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have said all those hurtful words to you. It was unnecessary and hurtful. But I just want you to know that I do everything is for your sake. I scold and nag at you is because I care about you. Ritsu, you are my son so I really care about you even though I always scold you and sometimes hurt you. You are my only son so you are very precious to me so please promise me. Promise me that you will value your life more than anything in this world. You are still young and you have many doors and opportunities open for you, so value your life and live it to the fullest. I promised your father and now I promise you that I won't make any more decisions without consulting you before hand, I'll let you decide how you want to live your own life. You are old and mature enough to make your own decisions. Once again, I apologise for my behavior and I sincerely hope that you can forgive me. Remember Ritsu, your life is precious so treasure it dearly. I love you.'

My mother loves me... she loves me...

After replying a quick thank you, forgiving her and saying a I love you too back to her, I slid off the bed to wash up.

Along the way to the bathroom, I could smell pancakes. My stomach growled and I placed my hands on top of it, trying to hide as much sound as possible. When I was done washing up, I went to the kitchen to make 2 cups of coffee. While waiting for the coffee to brew, I picked up the cutlery and started setting up the table. By the time I was done setting up, the coffee had just finished brewing. I poured 2 cups full of coffee and placed them on the table. While waiting for Takano-san, my eyes scanned the living room, looking for something to do. From the corner of my eye, I spotted a piece of paper tucked under the fax machine. I slid the paper out from under the machine. When I saw what that paper was about, my eyes immediately darted to the most important part of the paper.

When my eyes found what they were looking for, they just stayed there, not moving. My grip on the paper loosened and it fluttered to the floor but I continued standing there, frozen. I didn't want to believe it but it was true. The rankings for the magazine was out.

1\. Ichinose Erika

2\. Yoshikawa Chiharu

3\. Yamada

4\. Satou Iori

5\. Mutou Yukina

I'm grateful that Mutou-sensei didn't move down but Satou-sensei moved down. I was honestly disappointed. Even though I knew that I was in a bad state during this release, I let my emotions affect my work, I wasn't being professional and serious about my work. I felt someone's hand on my shoulder and turned around to face Takano-san.

When his eyes landed on the piece of paper on the floor, he looked back at me and I just stared at him. After a while, I bent down and picked up the piece of paper. When I was about to pass it back to him, he stopped me and held my wrist.

"Ritsu. Don't worry about your author's rankings. We all know that you were not feeling 100% during the past few days. Don't let it bring you down, we all know that you are capable of doing more and better. So don't worry about it, alright?"

I slowly nodded. Satou-sensei's rankings did bother me and I knew that I wasn't being professional about my work, but I was more upset that Takano-san didn't show this to me.

"Takano-san, why didn't you tell me that the rankings came out?"

"I was going to tell you while we were having breakfast, while I was with you. I was scared that you might do something reckless and I just wanted to be there to stop and help you."

"Oh... Thank you for caring so much about me..."

"Anything for my lover." He gave a quick hug and pulled me to the table for our breakfast.

It had been so long since I was able to eat food without throwing it up so the pancakes and coffee tasted like heaven. When we were done with our breakfast, we cleared the table before sitting on the couch to watch a movie. I sat next to Takano-san and I huddled against him. Takano-san was just so warm, so comforting, so safe. I nuzzled against his chest and eventually ended up leaning against his chest while we just sat there watching TV until it was interrupted by:

"Ritsu, I love you. Do you love me back?"

That was sudden. Normally, I would push him away and tell him that I didn't love him when I actually did. However, this time, I felt like he has done so much for me that he deserves to know the truth. I took in a deep breath and replied. "Yes. I love you Masamune."

He leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on my forehead before continuing.

"Ritsu, the rental for our whole building is going to rise. I'm worried that the increase in price might be too much for you so I was wondering. Do you want to live together?"

"Live together? Me and you? But I'm such a mess!"

"That's a part that I love about you too." He smirked as he rested his chin on my head.

I blushed and eventually replied: "I'd love you. Please take care of me."

"I'm counting on you to take care of me too." Masamune replied before kissing me on the lips and pulling me into a hug.


	22. Chapter 22: Ending

It was official now, I had shifted everything from my apartment to Masamune's. Surprisingly, his apartment had enough space for all our things. I am living with Masamune, my lover. The past few days had been hectic. Work had started and we were busy shifting and unpacking everything as well. We took a total of 5 to shift everything over and arrange all the furniture. It may seem like a few days but even with me having very few possessions, my apartment was in a state of chaos so it took really long to pack everything. We had stayed up together doing our work only to realise that it was already morning.

Of course, with all the stress from having to unpack, selling the furniture and work, I had almost lost myself once. But Masamune was there to pull me back. Now that I am with Masamune, I know that he has my back and that he is always looking out for me, giving me a sense of security. I know it's not right to do all the taking so I had to do some giving too. It had been exceptionally tough for Masamune as he being the head of editors, he had many meetings and a huge work load. Moreover, he has been helping me unpack my belongings everyday without fail with a cold. So I decided that it was my turn to help him. I would give him his medicine, make porridge for him and basically took care of him.

It has been exactly 1 week since I agreed to move in with my boss. It has been exactly 1 week since I finally admitted that I loved Masamune. When we went back to work, the first thing I saw on my desk was a hand written message. It was from Yokozawa-san. It read:

'To Onodera Ritsu. I apologise for all my verbal insults that I have been throwing at you. I now realise the damage that it has done to you and I am deeply apologetic about it. I hope that you will find it in your heart to forgive me. Yokozawa'

As I was reading the message, Masamune hugged me from behind and asked me what that was. After telling him that it was a message from Yokozawa-san, he took out his phone while saying:

"Yokozawa? That's alot of words from someone who hates writing or typing things." He showed me all his messages with Yokozawa-san. He was right, all the messages were either 1 worded replies or just a short sentence. He was being really sincere and I was touched by this. I quickly took out a piece of paper and wrote a quick reply to him, thanking him for being so stern with me work-wise as it has made me more meticulous about my work and of course forgiving him.

The rest of the day passed by quickly without any incidents work-wise. For my authors, when I told them their rankings, they were surprisingly alright with it. Satou-sensei was actually surprised that her ranking was still in the top 5. She explained to me that the work she sent me was of low quality and that she hoped that didn't cause me additional work on my side. Assuring her that no additional work was added, we ended the call.

Just when I ended the call, some workers from another department came up to my desk. When I saw their faces, I remembered that they were the ones talking about me behind my back.

"Onodera-kun, we are sorry for insulting you. We now know that you do your work whole-heartedly and that you don't rely on anyone to help you. We are terribly sorry."

"Ah... It's ok don't worry."

After settling that, I had received a call from my mother. Hearing a foreign ring-tone, Masamune looked up at me and I quickly walked out before answering the call.

"Hi Ritsu, sorry am I bothering you?"

"No, why are you calling me now? How's your holiday with father?"

"Oh I'm just calling on you to check on you. Are you doing alright? How's the new apartment, is Masamune taking good care of you? Oh and our holiday has been great but it would be better if you were with us but I understand that you are busy with work.."

"I'm glad you are enjoying yourselves. I'm good, the apartment is really cozy and Masamune-"

"Don't worry madam, I am taking very good care of your son, you need not worry." Masamune took the phone out of my hand and turned on speaker mode.

"Masamune. If you make my baby cry, I will never forgive you. I assure you that I will hunt you down if you hurt my Ritsu."

"No worries madam, I promise that I will never ever hurt him or make him cry. Ritsu is my lover and I will not allow anyone to harm him in anyway."

"That's good. Ritsu, you found yourself a good suit. I am proud of you. Work hard!"

"Thanks mom. Bye."

After I tucked my phone back into my pocket, I looked up into Masamune's eyes.

"Masamune, I promise that I won't let anyone hurt or harm you in any way as well."

"Hmm? Really? How exactly are you going to do that?"

"I... er... I'll..."

"Haha." He rustled my hair. "You're way to young to be saying things like that."

"You aren't that much older than me you know."

"I know. But I am willing to give up my life for the one I love. I am willing to risk everything I have just for you, Ritsu."

He kissed me on the lips and I gladly leaned in on it. When we parted for air, I replied:

"Aww. So you are willing to give up your position as head-editor to me?"

"Ha. You wish."

And just like that, our life's journey has just began. There will be many obstacles but I'm sure we can pull through together. As long as I have Masamune, I can do anything. Despite this horrible experience, I am grateful for everything that has happened. Things had only been a little different, but that little difference has pulled and Masamune closer. Without this little difference in my life, I never would have the courage to confess my love to him. Now that I am together with Masamune, my life will definitely be a little different.


End file.
